Season 9 Extras
by Language Nerd
Summary: Season 9 scenes I imagine would have happened during or after the episodes. Focuses mainly on Deeks and Kensi (Densi) but will feature the other characters as well.
1. Chapter 1 (9x1)

This is the very first fanfic that I'm posting :) I love NCIS:LA and I've been reading Ncis: Los Angeles fanfics for a while now. I had some ideas in my head so I've decided to start writing.

I've written some other stories that I hope to post soon but this will be about the scenes that I imagine would have happened during or after the show.

This picks up after the first episode of season 9 _Party Crashers_ (9x1).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

They entered their home after having drinks with Sam. They had talked about how he and the kids were doing, what Hetty could be up to and how Kensi proposed to Deeks. It was great to have him around again. The past few months have been tough not only on Sam but the entire team.

Kensi walked straight to the couch and plopped down. "I'm exhausted." She said leaning her head back.

"Me too. It was a long day." He said looking through the mail.

"Yeah, it was. Did you get hurt by the car?" She was referring to Sam driving into him in order to distract their suspect and take him in.

"I'm okay. I'll probably be sore tomorrow though." He put the mail aside and sat down next to her on the couch. "What did you think of Mosley?"

"Honestly?" She had tried to conceal her emotions today when Callen asked if she was alright but the truth was, she didn't like that Mosley sent Deeks back to LAPD at all. Callen is a great partner but he isn't her partner.

"Yeah." He looked at her.

"She just seems so…"

"Strict, adamant, definite, inflexible, uncompromising..."

"Yeah, she wouldn't even hear you out." She was really frustrated. She hated not having control of the situation. Even if she didn't always like it, Hetty would always have a plan to fix it.

"I know but it'll be okay." He was trying to convince himself as well.

"Do you think she knows about us? I mean she seems to do everything by the book. Is she going to allow our relationship?" Kensi was worried.

"It doesn't matter Kens. I can stay for now, we'll just have to wait and see what happens. Nothing's gonna to tear us apart." She smiled. That seemed to be their running motto.

They fell into a comfortable silence and Kensi put her head on his shoulder. She played with a loose thread on his shirt. "What happened at your Mom's house that was so scarring?" She said jokingly as that thought popped into her head.

"I'd rather not talk about it." He looked ill but she could tell that it wasn't that bad.

"Come on tell me." Kensi laughed. "What happened?"

"I walked in on her and a guy." Kensi's eyes got big but she was still amused. "Whose name happened to be Guy which they say differently in French apparently, Gee or something." He rambled on.

"Like actually doi..."

"No! She was wearing a towel and he had boxers on." He looked like a small child who was sulking.

"Oh baby, that must have been terrifying." She sympathized.

"It was." He was still pouting and she could barely hold back her smile. "I tackled him and then she walked in yelling at me. After that she just had to emphasize the time she's been spending with Guy."

"I'm sorry." She was sincere. "But Deeks, she's an adult and so are you. You can't control who she spends her time with. Even if you don't like it, you're gonna have to accept it."

"Yeah and what if it was your mom? Huh?"

"Alright we're done talking about this." He was right, that thought horrified her. "What about the engagement? Did you tell her?"

"Yeah she already knew about it. Apparently your Mom did tell her and then she didn't call us right away so…"

"She knew already? I didn't tell my Mom not to say anything because I thought you were gonna tell her right away." She pushed his shoulder slightly.

"I know. I feel bad."

"I feel horrible. We must have hurt her feelings." She really wished they had told her sooner.

"She said she doesn't care but she does. I know she does."

"Of course she does, she's your Mom."

"She's blaming her relations with Guy on my lack of calls lately."

"Deeks, she's lonely."

"She definitely wasn't lonely today."

"Deeks…"

"I know. I should have called her. I should call her more often." He corrected himself. He hasn't put a lot of effort in lately. "She just always wants to get so involved with everything I tell her. It started after I… after I shot my Father. I think she felt like she couldn't protect me before so after that, anything I did, she would get overly involved in and she can get hectic sometimes."

"Is that why she was never your next of kin?" Kensi remembered the moment he told her about his Mom. She had thought it was weird that his Mom hadn't been his next of kin back then.

"Exactly, if she would have gotten called every time I was in the hospital, she wouldn't have let me out of her sight again."

"She cares about you so much."

"I know." He really felt guilty now.

"I think we should go see her." Kensi suggested making a move to get up.

He was caught off guard. "Like now?" He pulled her back down.

"Yes."

"Yeah no, I think I've seen too much of her for one day." He really didn't want a repeat of this morning.

"Deeks, I'm serious." She really wanted to apologize.

"She probably has Guy there." He tried to defend his reasoning.

"Well then it's the perfect opportunity to get to know him." She wasn't backing down at all.

"Really?" He whined.

"Yes really. Deeks if he makes her happy then that's all you could ask for." Deeks seemed reluctant but Kensi was already up and moving. She put the engagement ring back on her finger because she didn't wear it at work and soon they were out the door.

* * *

They rang the doorbell and waited not wanting to repeat his actions of this morning by barging in. Moments later Roberta opened the door.

"Kensi, it's so nice to see you." Roberta wrapped her arms around Kensi. "You on the other hand…" She said looking at Deeks.

"Alright." He said with his nasally voice. Roberta and Kensi walked further into the house leaving him to close the door. "No, G-u-y tonight?" He asked stressing every syllable.

"Oh stop being such a drama queen Martin." They all went to sit down in the living room.

"I'm just showing interest." He defended himself.

"No, he's not. You happy?"

"Ecstatic." He said repeating Kensi's words from earlier that morning.

"Yep that's exactly how Kensi's Mom felt when she found out about your engagement." Roberta said annoyed and Kensi glared at him.

"Mom I'm sorry."

"We're really sorry. We should have called you right away." Kensi added on.

"I know it's not your fault Kensi. Marty and I both just have a way of not telling each other what's going on in our lives." She had enough things she didn't tell her son about, Guy for example.

"Mom…"

"Save it Martin, what's done is done." Kensi looked at Deeks not knowing how to respond. "Let's put it behind us and move on."

"Okay." He nodded but he was sure this wouldn't be the last he'd hear of it

"Now I want to hear the story. How did you propose Marty?"

"I actually proposed to him." Kensi went ahead and said.

"Well when you want to get something done, you know you can't trust Marty. You just have to take matters into your own hands."

He rolled his eyes. "I proposed to her three times."

Kensi was quick to explain. "The first time doesn't count cause you never asked me, the second time I wasn't conscious and the third time…"

"You declined my proposal." Deeks cut in right away.

"You didn't complete the question."

"You didn't let me because you were…" His voice faded remembering that moment. She had stopped him from continuing because she didn't want to be in a wheelchair for the proposal or the rest of their marriage. "We just weren't ready yet but I guess I waited a little too long to ask again." He smiled at Kensi and then to his mother.

"Yes, you did. I couldn't wait any longer." Kensi looked at Deeks with so much love.

"I'm very happy for you guys." Roberta said sincerely. "And I'm not getting as involved as you expected I would, am I?"

"And you're back." Deeks knew she couldn't keep her sarcastic remarks away for long.

"That's a beautiful ring you picked out Martin." She said holding Kensi's hand up to get a better look.

"Thank you Momma."

"Congratulations you guys." She said as she hugged Kensi.

"Thank you Mrs. Deeks."

"I've told you before you're welcome to call me Roberta or Bertie."

Then Deeks gave his Mom a hug. "You did good sweetheart and I'm not talking about the ring." She whispered in his ear.

He agreed.

* * *

Thank you so much for reading! Any tips or suggestions are welcomed.


	2. Chapter 2 (9x2)

Finally here are the extra scenes for the second episode of season 9. I'm already working on 9x3 which had some great Densi scenes so that will be up soon. Also I have a cover photo now :)

This picks up after the second episode of season 9 _Se Murio El Payaso_ (9x2).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

"We're buying tonight." Kensi said.

"You guys don't have to do that."

"We insist. We're not the ones who look like… that." Deeks said pointing his finger at Callen and Anna.

They took their seats at the table and the waitress came right over. "Can I get you all something to drink?"

"Beers all around?" Deeks asked and everyone agreed. "Beers all around." He stated again enthusiastically.

"Coming right up."

"So you got thrown down a flight of stairs?" Deeks asked Anna.

"Nope, that was me." Callen clarified. "She got hit right in the face."

"Yeah, it's going to hurt even more tomorrow." Anna added lightly touching the cut on her lip.

"We didn't want to use our weapons to alert the others so we had to fight our way out of it with our bare hands." He told quite dramatically. "How was your day?" Addressing both Kensi and Deeks.

"So long." Deeks whined.

"She didn't want to talk?" Callen asked amused at the detective's mood.

"Oh no she talked… a lot." Kensi explained.

"Hours of nonsense about Los Angeles and where she should buy a house." Deeks went on.

"And then she totally tried to hit on me." Kensi added to the story.

"With Deeks in the room?" Anna wondered.

"No he was getting her a glass of water when she tried to convince me that I didn't have to be with him but that I could be with her. It was so awkward but I had her convinced right up until I asked her if she was in LA to supervise the transfer of her family's counterfeit notes."

"Did she give it up?" Callen wondered.

"No not at that point."

The waitress brought the beers and they ordered a crab platter and several sides for everyone to share.

"What was the deal with her?" Callen asked continuing their conversation.

"Turns out she wasn't really Lucila, Marca's daughter, but Claudia the housekeeper's daughter and at some point they switched places and she took over the role of the mysterious counterfeiter's daughter."

"How'd you figure that out?"

"The real Claudia had a birthmark on her neck, Lucila didn't."

"It took all day but we figured her out." Deeks said cockily taking a sip of his beer.

"Excuse me, I figured it out." Kensi clarified.

"No no no that's not how this works, we're partners therefore we're a team so 'we' figured it out." She stared at him blankly for his explanation and Callen and Anna just laughed.

Kensi turned back to look at Callen and Anna. "At least Mosley wasn't involved today."

"Callen told me about her." Anna made a face that showed she was not impressed and they all laughed.

"Have you found anything on Hetty?" Deeks asked Callen. He knew he was trying to figure out what Hetty was doing last week but he hadn't mentioned her since then.

"No, not yet. Still looking."

"It's so weird why wouldn't she say anything before she left?" Kensi said.

"This isn't the first time she's disappeared but maybe Sam was right and she just doesn't want to be found." Callen had searched many places but nothing came up.

"It's so frustrating." Kensi said and everyone got quiet for a moment.

"What have you been up to Anna?" Deeks changed the subject completely.

"She's been playing video games." Callen answered before she could.

"Not just any video game, Halo 5." She defended.

"Hey, we're not judging." Deeks said.

"I'm waiting to hear if I got the job at ATF. I have a meeting friday, so fingers crossed." Anna explained.

"Well I'm sure you'll get it, you're a great agent." Kensi said sincerely. She hasn't always been very kind to Anna, especially last year when she feared that Anna would take her spot on the team and replace her but a lot has changed since then.

"Thank you. I'm hopeful."

"You're gonna get the job. You're amazing." Callen said looking Anna in the eye. She smiled back at him.

Kensi and Deeks felt kind of awkward having to watch their exchange as Anna and Callen didn't seem to remember they were there but they soon recovered and spent the rest of the time at the restaurant catching up and eating.

* * *

He sat at the dining room table, checking his emails on his laptop and she was in the kitchen getting dishes out of the dishwasher and putting them away. "Anna and Callen still seem very close." Kensi stated. They never had real confirmation of a relationship but they could tell there was something.

"Yeah, they seem happy. I mean Callen seems to be doing really well. The whole thing with Joelle is behind him and he's moving on, it's good."

"Mhm, do you think they know how obvious they are?"

"Do you think we were that obvious?" He added.

"I didn't think so, but then again they all found out about us before we told them."

"That's very true."

Her thoughts were still going over today's events and she wanted to talk to him about it. "What did you think of Lucila or Claudia?"

"You jealous Fern?"

She looked at him with surprise. "Uhm you're the one who should be jealous, she hit on me." She turned back around to put another plate in the cupboard.

"I know we didn't exactly do what Callen and Anna did today but I'm still so tired." He whined changing the subject.

"I know me too." She went along with it.

"I still would rather be chasing the bad guys than doing interrogation all day. It just felt like it took forever."

"Agreed." She sighed as she put the last plate away and leaned against the kitchen counter to look at him.

"You wanna move to Manhattan Beach or the Bird Streets?" He asked out of the blue.

"Hah yeah when we win the lottery."

"God, I'd love that kind of house."

"I know, five bedrooms, a huge garden with a big pool or waking up every morning with a view of the ocean." She listed wistfully.

He looked at her. "Is that what you dream of? Cause we're never gonna have that kind of money."

"Deeks, don't start this again. I don't care about the money or the size of the house. We have the perfect home." He seemed to have some sort of need to give her nice things.

"You think so?" He was having a lot of doubts.

"Of course I do. Yeah it's fun to dream about big houses and expensive things but it's not realistic. I'm happy. I love our job and I love our home…" She seemed to be thinking about something but then she spoke. "Because I'm home wherever you are Deeks." She added softly walking over to stand behind him. She put her hands on his shoulders and started massaging them.

"That's nice." He said and she just laughed. She then moved to his head, roughing his hair back and forth. "Thank you this is what I needed." He wasn't just talking about the massage.

"Head massage." She said amused.

"Totally."

She laughed again running her fingers through his hair. "You and your crazy hair."

"You know you love my golden locks."

"I do." She leaned down and kissed his cheek. "And I love you."

"I love you too."

* * *

Thank you so much for reading!


	3. Chapter 3 (9x3)

Thank you so much for all the reviews. This chapter may have gotten a little too deep. I hope it's not too out of character but I feel like they, especially Kensi, act(s) differently at home than at work. For some reason I had a lot of trouble putting all the separate sentences I had written in the order I wanted so I'm just going to post it now.

This picks up after the third episode of season 9, _Assets_ (9x3).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

Sam had driven them home since they didn't have a car until the morning. They would be able to take Deeks' truck to get to work and then pick up the new temporary car from the motor-pool. They'd eaten dinner and were now sitting on the couch watching tv. Kensi wasn't really paying attention to the show that was playing as she was petting Monty and neither was Deeks because he was very busy doing something on his laptop.

Kensi was thinking about everything that had happened today. Their conversation about kids and then the shootout. Two things that just don't go together, agent and mom, yet somehow she's been trying to put them together in her mind for a while now. The one something she loves to be, the other something she wants to become. Her thoughts were interrupted when she heard Deeks speaking.

"Just look at it Kens, it's adorable." He had his computer screen turned to show her.

She looked over at the photo of the small surfboard and wetsuit. "It's so pink."

"I know but you gotta admit it's cute."

She kept looking at the pictures and then she smiled. "It really is."

"That's what I'm talking about." He turned back to his computer and continued to look at it.

She'd always assumed Deeks would want a miniature version of himself to be his surfing buddy but then again she was her Dad's buddy and she was a girl. "You teaching her how to stand up on the board and recognize when a good wave is coming." She could see the whole scene play out in her mind. The little girl loving the water as much as her dad did.

"It'd be terrific, right?"

"Mhm." Her mind wandered off again.

He noticed that she was distracted. "You okay?"

"Yeah, just thinking."

He closed his laptop and put it on the coffee table, then turned to look at her, giving her all his attention. "About what?"

"The day." She sighed and moved her arm to lean her head against it on the top part of the couch. "Mosley didn't seem very positive today and Hidoko didn't either."

Not exactly what he thought she was thinking about. "Yeah… Mosley knows we're engaged."

"Is that why you want to take the next step? Is she going to split us up, send you back to LAPD?" Kensi lifted her head up immediately panicked.

"I don't know Kens. But we're just getting to a certain point..."

"I know, I know." She seemed to be struggling with the idea.

"But I don't want to pressure you into feeling like you have to quit because you're the woman… it's 2017, you proposed to me, there is no way I expect you to do that just because you're the mother. You love doing this job Kens and if you want to keep doing this job, then that's okay."

She nodded but didn't say anything instead she just got up, grabbed her empty glass off the coffee table and walked to the kitchen.

"Kens?" He asked following her. "Kens, look at me, what's wrong?" She seemed hesitant to look at him.

"I've been thinking about what you said, if we leave for the day neither of us should fear being shot at and not coming home at the end of the day. I don't want that for our child." She said very seriously not backing out of the conversation like she did earlier in the day. "But what would we do if we quit? This job is just such a part of me and I feel like my entire life prepared me to do exactly this…" She shared.

"I get what you're saying." He understood that this was who she was. She lives for this job. Camping with her father and learning survival skills, being a Marine's daughter and wanting to find his killer and having Jack in her life and not being able to help him, all contributed to her decision to become an NCIS agent.

"But with everything that happened this past year with the helicopter crash, Sullivan or Ferris and then Michelle…" She got quiet. It hit her hard every time she thought about it. "Now Mosley's stirring things up and even today we were being shot at. I... It just puts things in perspective." She explained.

"It's a tough decision."

"It is but Hetty talked to me once about what I wanted to have left after the job is over. And I know what I want, I want to start a family. I want to have a baby with you." She stated clearly.

His smile grew when she said that. "Me too."

"Ah I can't believe I'm already worrying about our hypothetical child." She laughed.

He lowered his voice. "You're gonna be a great mom to little Princess Sunshine Deeks." He mocked knowing it would get a response.

"There's no way we are ever naming our child Princess."

"Yeah and you think Athena is better?" Continuing to bait her.

"Totally. It's from the Greek goddess of wisdom and warfare and courage." She listed.

"She'd be fighting on the side of justice naturally." He had his wicked smile.

"Exactly."

"Well for someone who thinks they'd be a good mom to a boy, it seems like you've put a lot of thought behind a girl's name, unless you're deciding to name your son that."

She pushed his shoulder slightly. "Of course not."

"Why are you so reluctant to have a girl?"

"I just feel that I would be a better mom to a boy." She explained.

"Why?" He asked playfully.

She tilted her head back and then moved it sideways letting out a sigh. She always did this when she was embarrassed. "I never wore dresses, I didn't like pink, I didn't gossip with other girls about my crush or wear makeup everyday. As a mom I would have to have girl talks and teach her about growing up and boyfriends and my mom wasn't there for a huge part of my teen years so I don't know how that goes. I guess I've just never been too great at being a girl, still aren't..." She mumbled at the end.

"What? Kens, you may not think so but when you're with your friends Kat, Mindy, Mandy, Tiffany and Tiffany, reading your bridal magazines or when we used to babysit Kam, you're a total girly girl." It didn't seem to really register in her mind. "And I don't know about you but when I look at you, you've totally got all the…" He said pointing at the form of her body.

She just rolled her eyes. "Oh, shut up."

He laughed but then sobered up. "You're a beautiful woman Kens and you're gonna be an amazing mom to any boy or girl we have. We'll teach them all we know with our life experiences and then they'll figure it out and find their way." He came to stand right in front of her and wrapped his arms around her. "We're gonna take it as it comes, Princess."

"See, how could you name our daughter that when I'm your princess?" She asked teasingly.

"Touché." He kissed her and then whispered. "You're also my sunshine."

* * *

Thank you so much for reading!


	4. Chapter 4 (9x4)

Thank you again for all the kind reviews! I don't know why I was so indecisive with my word choices this week. There were just so many ways I wanted to write things.

I'm not sure why Deeks went to the motor pool again, wouldn't they have gotten to use the same car all week? But anyway, it doesn't matter cause I loved the scenes with Kensi and Deeks and the Porsche :)

This picks up after the fourth episode of season 9, _Plain Sight_ (9x4).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

The morning had started off slow. Kensi was the first person to enter the bullpen and she had sent Deeks down to the motor pool to pick up a car for the day. She sat down at her desk and took her laptop out of her bag. There was still some paperwork she needed to finish and there was no better time than the present to get started with that. She worked for a short while until Nell came down to tell her that she and Deeks were to see if they could find a guy named Tony Young.

"You're never going to believe the car I picked out." Deeks said as he walked into the bullpen with the car keys in his hand.

"You seem way too happy right now."

"It's fantastic." The excitement evident on his face.

"What have you done?"

"Nothing wrong obviously, the universe is repaying me for my hard work and dedication to this job." His smile was so big.

She shook her head. He could be so self-confident sometimes, what was she saying? More often than not, his confidence was too high but now he just sounded ridiculous. "No." She turned her attention back to the file she was reading on her computer. "We have a lead Nell wants us to follow."

"I pulled the car up front, so I'm ready whenever you are."

Closing her laptop. "Alright, let's go."

* * *

"Why didn't you choose the car we had yesterday?" She said looking at the car in front of her.

"Because this is a Porsche." He said as if it was the most obvious answer in the world.

They've had to pick up a different car everyday but this hadn't been one of the choices before. "Why was this car even in the motor pool?"

"Probably for some rich person undercover op. Why can't we get those kinds of covers instead of say, the homeless guy?"

"I guess it just suits you better somehow." She joked.

"Touché."

"Touché."

"Uhm that's not…" How she was supposed to use it, she knew. His squirm was just too good to miss out on.

"This isn't a car we can use." She disrupted as she looked at it.

"Sure it is."

"What if we get in a shootout like the one last week? This car is way too expensive for that."

"Relax, nothing's going to happen."

"Famous last words."

"Oh and I'm definitely driving." Deeks stated very clearly.

"Fine by me, I'm not going to be responsible for this."

* * *

They walked out of the mission, Kensi pushing him through the door. Of course he had to pick the one car that was from their new boss. Now Mosley was going to be watching the surveillance footage to figure out that it was them driving her car. Kensi was usually the one who drove but she had been letting him drive the truck and other borrowed cars all week and the Porsche today as well. She was pleased that she was getting her Audi back tomorrow though.

"I'm sorry, you can't drive your new Porsche home." Kensi said as they got into his truck.

"Baby, this isn't good." All Kensi did was laugh. "This isn't funny."

"Kinda is."

"She already wants to fire me and now she has another reason."

She turned serious. "I know. I just can't imagine not spending everyday all day with you." She looked him straight in the eye. "I love that you're next to me when we're interrogating suspects, watching my back when we enter a building with our weapons drawn or just having you with me making me laugh. We wouldn't have these moments anymore where we drive Porsches and wear matching sunglasses."

"It is pretty special."

"I don't ever want that to change."

"Me neither." He figured their partnership would eventually change in some way, that they would get split up at some point. He just didn't want it to be over something as simple as a confusion of which cars were available to drive. He didn't want to draw more of Mosley's attention to himself when she was already trying to make him leave NCIS.

"What is that look?" Kensi asked.

"What was her car even doing in the motorpool? And why does she have a Porsche?"

"I really don't know." She said softly but then her thoughts wandered back to the past. "Do you remember the time I had to drive Hetty's car? Eric and Nell were telling me not to and you needed me to drive it in order to distract everyone."

"Oh yeah, of course I do."

"That was so much fun. Hetty didn't even end up being angry at me. Maybe Mosley will take it easy on us too."

"Mhm."

Deciding they'd been sitting here awhile she said. "I'm hungry. Can we go?"

"Yeah in a sec." He said automatically while he was busy with his phone.

"Wow, no jokes about my eating habits." She still didn't get a response. "What are you doing?"

"I'm texting Eric and Nell to delete the evidence."

"It's probably too late." She didn't want Mosley to find out but she had to stay realistic.

"I have to try but they're not responding."

"You don't want to get them in trouble."

"I know that but it's worth a shot. She can't find out about this like ever."

"She already knows someone drove her car Deeks and you scratched it."

"I didn't scratch it, Young James Bond today thought he could escape by leaping over the Porsche, who does that?"

"Who does he think he is?" She asked playing along with his shock.

"I know." He said exasperated. "Oh you were being sarcastic again. Twice in one day." He said almost impressed.

"At least Mosley doesn't seem to have Hetty's knowing senses."

"That's true. She would have already known and then played along as if she was clueless. She would just bide her time until she found the right moment to punish me. What if Mosley already knows? You think she knows? I thinks she knows." He whispered at the end.

"Well when she finds out I'm sure we'll hear about it. She has comments about everything else we do wrong."

"I just look so good driving a Porsche." He said sadly flipping through the selfies he took on his phone. He'd started deleting the photos but they were still stored in a different file.

"You have to stop thinking about it. I'm not going to listen to you whine all evening about missing your car." She grabbed the phone out of his hands. "Now drive."

He started the car and drove out of the parking lot. She had his phone in her hands and decided to take a look at it. She scrolled through the pictures he'd taken. There were several of the car itself from all angles, the side, the front, the back, the logo. Then there were several selfies of him with the car in the background. When had he even taken all these? There were just so many. She smiled as she looked at the selfies he had taken when he'd been sitting next to her.

"You're so cute."

"I'm cute?"

"Yes, and you do look good with the Porsche."

"Right? That's what I'm telling you."

She kept scrolling because there were just so many but she stopped when she saw a picture of herself. How had she not seen him take it? She was so observant or so she thought. The picture wasn't even that bad if she did say so herself. She was looking up with her sunglasses on and she had a slight smile on her face.

"What are you smiling about?" Apparently the smile had transferred from the picture onto her face.

"I like this picture of myself." She didn't usually compliment her own looks but she felt good about this one.

"The Porsche makes everyone look good." She glared at him and he laughed. "Don't worry, you always look beautiful."

* * *

Thank you for reading :)


	5. Chapter 5 (9x5)

Thank you for the reviews. I'm not completely happy with how this is put together and I'm sorry this has taken a little longer to post after the episode but I didn't want to wait any longer so I decided to just post it.

This picks up after the fifth episode of season 9, _Mountebank_ (9x5).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

They arrived back at the mission with all their gear, heading straight for the armory. The suspects had been taken into custody and overwatch spray had successfully been applied to Sokolov. Overall it had been a job well done.

"I can't wait to get home." Kensi said as she placed her bag on the workbench.

"Tired?" Callen laughed a little also unpacking his bag.

"Yes and I'm starving." She said.

"You're always hungry." Deeks just had to say it.

"We didn't really have a proper lunch today." She defended herself.

"Oh please, I saw you nibbling on your snacks throughout the day."

"My point exactly, not a proper lunch."

Callen enjoyed hearing his younger agents banter with each other. "Good work today everyone." He turned towards Hidoko who was standing near the shelves. "Especially you, Hidoko."

"Thanks." Hidoko put the overwatch spray back into the case and stored it where it belonged. She looked up at the three other agents again. "I'm going to go talk to Mosley."

"Alright." They watched her leave the armory and then turned to look at each other again. They weren't completely comfortable with their new team member yet but they were trying.

"How was Arkady?" Callen asked.

"Charming as always." Deeks said as he took off his bullet proof vest.

"Yeah?"

"We woke him up at just before eleven."

"He was in his bathrobe." She added.

"He still had to get ready." Deeks said cryptically.

"It was so awkward. We had to wait while he showered." She paused for effect. "In his bedroom."

"We saw him wearing nothing but a towel… with his stomach." He said sounding slightly traumatized.

"And we saw it again when he lost his shirt at poker." She shook her shoulders, shivering out of horror.

"Poker?"

"Yes, we had to win a poker game each time we wanted to ask a question."

"That's how I got all the jewelry."

"And Tomo." She looked to Deeks to confirm.

"Tomo." He said enthusiastically. "Arm wrestling and that disgusting little drink."

She looked at Callen. "It was just weird all around. I could go on and on."

"I get the picture." Callen laughed.

They made sure all the weapons were secure and packed away in their cases. After putting their bags in their usual spots, they started walking towards the bullpen.

"How was your day?"

"Definitely not as eventful as yours."

"You know who the kid was who stole your alias?"

"Not yet, I'm heading to the boatshed to question him now."

"He's still there?" Deeks asked.

"Yeah, I haven't had time to talk to him today."

"Wow, that's a long time to wait."

"Well, he's in a lot of trouble if it was really him who stole your alias." Kensi said.

"Yeah." Callen said not sounding quite as convincing.

* * *

Kensi and Deeks stopped at the taco truck near the beach on the way home. Deciding they hadn't had tacos in a while, Deeks ordered the fish tacos and Kensi the chicken ones. They were seated at a table looking out over the ocean. The sun had gone down long before they had gotten off of work but it was still nice out. The moon reflected in the water as they ate their food quietly.

"It's not often that we have such an eventful day." Deeks broke their pleasant silence.

"Yeah, cause the casual shoot-out and car chase just don't cut it."

"You know what I mean."

"It was pretty fun." She agreed, between bites.

"I could see you as Arkady's daughter." He joked.

"Ah stop."

"You don't like that thought?" He continued, knowing that she was squirming at the idea.

"Not at all. It's creepy. Did you see the way he said it?"

"Yeah." He laughed. "It's too bad I couldn't keep my chains."

She almost choked but instead coughed and then finally swallowed her food. "Yeah, it's too bad." Her tone not really serious.

"Why'd I even have to turn it in?" Deciding not to acknowledge her sarcasm.

"Because it was evidence, part of the case."

"It wasn't really, I won it all fair and square."

Kensi decided to leave it at that, until she heard him sigh. "You're moping."

"I'm not moping." She gave him a look that said 'really?', so he gave in. "Alright, but just think about the possibilities. I would fit in perfectly with the Russians. I could make money and get the bling."

"Please stop. It's not even really legal."

"Gotta pay to play, baby."

"Well, you're not going to pay or play."

"You're no fun."

"Your alternate career choice is not going to be playing poker with the Russians."

"I did like my jewelry."

"First the man-bun now the jewelry, what is going on with you?"

"I don't know, but you liked the way I got the necklaces, right?"

"With pure luck?" She asked, talking about the poker when she knew he was referring to the arm wrestling.

"The muscles, I'm talking about my muscles." He said making a point to flex his arm. "This got us the information we needed."

"Alright."

"But you're pretty proud?"

"Oh yeah. Me asking the questions and you wearing the jewelry."

"What can I say, you're the bang to my bling." He smirked.

"Uhm, that doesn't sound right."

"Does to me."

She touched his arm and felt his muscles. "It was very sexy when you won from Tomo."

"I think we should head home." He grabbed both of their the paper plates and threw them away quickly, making sure they could get home as fast as they possibly could.

She just shook her head laughing as he grabbed her hand to walk back to the car.

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	6. Chapter 6 (9x6)

Thank you for all the reviews, favorites and follows! We didn't get a final scene with Kensi and Deeks, they only spoke once, drinking coffee, so that needed to change :)

I feel like I write a lot of emotional stuff for Kensi and Deeks, even if they weren't emotional on the show but I just love seeing them showing emotions and the next episode looks so good. It looks heartbreaking, I'm so excited.

Also, I'm really slow at writing these chapters. I don't know how people write it the day after the episode has aired. Props to them! It takes me a really long time to put all my ideas into one story that flows. Anyway, this author's note is too long already so enjoy this chapter.

This picks up after the sixth episode of season 9, _Can I Get A Witness_ (9x6).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

She walked into the boat shed and saw him standing by the table. His mind was obviously somewhere else because he hadn't even heard her come in.

"Hey." She spoke softly so she didn't scare him.

He turned to look at her. "Hey."

The exhaustion of the day was evident in his voice so she walked over to him and went straight into his arms, hugging him fiercely. There's no place she'd rather be.

"How long have you been standing here?" She pulled back to look at his face but her arms stayed around him.

"Not long. Bates and Whiting left a little while ago."

She made a face at the thought of him with those two. "Everything good?"

He laughed. "Yeah, yeah it's good. There's a lot of corruption within the LAPD but I'm just glad Bates isn't involved with that. I mean it's what I expected but I'm happy to have that confirmation..." His voice faded as his thoughts drifted back to the events of the day and the events of this past year. He had hoped Bates wasn't involved with any corruption so he was relieved when he found out he was right. They were both just trying to make the world a better place, one case at a time.

"You okay?" She asked softly.

"Yeah." Hoping he sounded convincing.

"Truth?"

"I'm just tired, Kens." She gave him a look. "Really, I'm good."

"Okay." She wasn't going to push him to tell her if he didn't want to. They finally pulled apart and he took a step back.

"I didn't see you much today." He stated.

"Yes you did."

"Well we didn't really get to talk much, just you and me."

"Yeah, it seems you were partnered with Bates for most of the day."

"Definitely not a partnership I want to continue."

"You miss me?" She asked cheekily.

"Oh yeah."

"Good." She said confidently.

"What? No I missed you too?"

She smiled. "Don't get me wrong, Nell is a great partner but she's just… not you."

"What were you guys up to today?" He asked to get back on a lighter note.

"Besides making sure your ass was being saved."

"Mhm." He was amused by her quips.

"Nell and I trained with the knife this morning."

"Yeah? How's that going?"

"Really well. She's getting better and better every time."

"That's great."

She agreed, Nell had been getting really skilled in various aspects of the job. "I really did miss you today though." She admitted.

"I missed you so much."

He lifted his hand to her cheek and pulled her face closer. He needed the closeness and the familiar scent of her shampoo. Their foreheads touched and they silently stood there just taking in each other's presence. He then slowly touched his lips to hers. He started kissing her more passionately until she pulled back slightly. "Deeks…"

"What?" He kissed her again.

She pulled back again. "Someone could be watching."

Deciding she wasn't going to continue this here, he stepped back. "I know for a fact that the meerkats aren't at OSP anymore and Hetty's not here to disturb us, like she did last time."

She smiled but then looked down sadly. "I know."

"We'll find her." He tried to reassure her.

"What if we don't? We never saw Granger again. It makes me sad." Explaining her feelings didn't always come easy to her but she's been trying to work on it. Their whole relationship revolved around communication, whether it was a lack of communication, actual speaking or just gestures. They've definitely come a very long way since the beginning of their relationship.

He took both her hands in his. "It makes me sad too." He admitted softly. "We just have to hope for the best." She nodded. "Let's go home."

"Okay."

"Is your car here?"

"No, Sam dropped me off, so we can just take your truck home, if it's not too dinged up. I'll get my car tomorrow."

"Okay."

They walked into the parking lot and she spotted the red truck right away. It was parked underneath a light post so when she walked up to the car she could see the damage clearly.

"Oh my god, Deeks all the paints gone." She looked at the side of his truck.

"Yeah, I know."

"Wow." She moved her fingers over the part where the red paint was gone.

"I'll be claiming that to my work related expenses."

"To Bates or Mosely?"

He made a face, both options weren't the best. "I haven't decided yet."

"We've had a lot of car reparations lately."

"We work so hard."

She chuckled. "That is very true."

They walked to their sides of the car to get in, Deeks taking the driver's side. Before he started the car, he decided to look at his phone. "You left me a voicemail?"

"No."

"It looks like you did."

"Uhm no I didn't, I know how you feel about voicemails." She knew that he didn't like it because he would never listen to them and she had taken over his reasoning, if you wanted to get a hold of them, write a text.

He held up his phone for her to look at, to show her the voicemail under her name. "I must've gotten distracted, worrying about you." She admitted softly.

"Worrying about me?"

"Yeah, I thought you were with Whiting and next thing I know there's a BOLO out on your truck and you're with Bates, who was the prime suspect in a shooting. Not knowing where you were or if you were okay, it just makes it that much harder to imagine not being partners everyday."

"I can't even begin to imagine it either. I always want to be with you, next to you, protecting you. I don't ever want you to feel like you're not safe." He lowered his voice. "I don't want either of us to feel lonely."

They were showing each other their emotions. "You're no longer Marty, Marty, the one man party. You've got me. All in, together."

"Together."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	7. Chapter 7 (9x7)

Thank you for all the reviews, favorites and follows! I thought this week's episode was amazing! I loved how the entire episode was so intense and that Kensi and Deeks showed their emotional sides and really communicated.

I don't think the episode needed anything to be added because I thought they did everything perfectly! Mostly Densi scenes 'wink, wink', that was awesome! But here are just some scenes that I filled in because I would have loved to see them if the episode could have been like 2 hours long :)

I know that in the beginning of this chapter they may seem like they're really mean to each other but as Callen said, their argument seemed to be about more than just grilled cheese. I had thought to keep it lighter with just a joke about the grilled cheese but I don't see her staying mad about that for that long.

Also, this is the longest chapter so far!

This picks up after the seventh episode of season 9, _The Silo_ (9x7).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

It was nearing dinnertime and Kensi had planned to keep it simple. They were both tired and Deeks wasn't feeling too good. She'd told him earlier that she was going to make grilled cheese because it was something she really liked and could actually make. Now she was sitting on the couch and he had been sitting at the dining room table until he stood up.

"Are you going to start?" Deeks asked now standing in the kitchen.

"Yeah." She said and then went back to her phone, making no move to get up.

"Anytime soon?"

"Yes, in a second." She said slightly irritated. She really wanted to finish what she was doing.

After a few moments of nothing, he walked into the kitchen again and started getting out pans and utensils. The noise of things clattering caught her attention.

She came over fast. "I said I would make it." She took the utensils out of his hands and put them down on the counter.

"Didn't look like it." He said as he went to sit down again and she rolled her eyes.

She got to work and made them each their grilled cheese sandwich. Putting the plates on the dining room table, one right in front of him, she sat down and took a bite right away.

He hadn't taken a bite yet. "What?" She asked.

"This is it?" He said as he looked at his plate.

"What's wrong with it?"

"What cheese did you use?"

"The one in the fridge." He obviously wasn't satisfied with it yet. "What do you want?"

"There's no tomatoes or onions to put on?"

"I'm not gonna be your housewife Deeks. You want something, go get it." She was frustrated.

"I know that, but you were making the dinner."

"And I did."

"It's just that I would have added some things."

"Well, then make it yourself next time." She stood up with her plate and dumped it on the counter with her grilled cheese barely eaten.

"I was going to." He said more to himself than to her.

She huffed an irritated laugh and moved the hair out of her face. "Whatever." She walked away heading upstairs.

"Kens…" He said but she was already gone.

* * *

She had woken up at 5:30am. Deeks was still sleeping so she laid in bed staring at the ceiling. She didn't know why she was still annoyed about dinner last night but she was. She knew he wasn't feeling well yesterday and he was grumpy but she couldn't shake off the irritation. Deciding she wanted to clear her mind, she went to get ready for a run.

When she came out of the bathroom with her sporting clothes on and her hair tied up, he wasn't in bed anymore. She walked downstairs and grabbed her shoes. "Morning." She muttered not looking at him.

He sighed deeply. "Good morning." He took a sip of his coffee as he watched her lace up her running shoes.

"See you at work." She said.

"Okay." He doubted she heard him because she shut the door quickly. Could she possibly still be that mad about last night? They'd both been tired and he was just in a bad mood. Now they were meeting at work which meant taking separate cars. He just knew this was going to be a long day

* * *

When Callen and Sam had started their search for Deeks, they weren't expecting to find what they did. They walked into the armory and saw that he had his head in his hands, obviously frustrated and sad. He'd been trying to call Kensi all day to tell her to get as far away from that place as possible.

"I take it, you haven't spoken to her yet." Callen pointed to the broken chair, pieces sprawled everywhere.

Deeks lifted his head when he heard Callen speak. "I did…" He still looked absolutely heartbroken. Callen and Sam looked each other in the eyes, they knew something was very wrong.

"What did she say?" They wondered what she had said to make him so melancholy.

Deeks just shook his head in disbelief. "It was… like a goodbye call and then she just hung up."

They were worried and needed to know more information. "Did she say what was going on?"

"No." They weren't sure what to say. "God I'm so stupid." Sam could see that he was slowly breaking.

"You're not stupid Dee..."

"An argument about grilled cheese, freaking grilled cheese." He threw the gun cases from the workbench. The loud crash of them hitting the ground made Sam and Callen jump slightly. "None of that matters now." He moved a hand through his hair and his breathing got heavy.

There was so much rage coming from Deeks but Sam stayed calm. "We don't wake up in the morning and expect not to come home. You can't blame yourself for being frustrated and having an argument with her. You're both human, you irritate each other sometimes, it doesn't mean you can beat yourself up about that. You can't prepare for things like this." Sam knew it was easier said than done, he definitely knew, but he had to try and tell him anyway.

"I should with this job. Every single time we walk out of the door, there's a chance one of us is isn't coming home at the end of the day." He took a moment to let what he had just said sink in. "I don't know how long I can keep doing this. If something happens to her…" He couldn't even finish the sentence.

"We have to hope for the best outcome but right now I think you need to get some air. Go to the courtyard or the rooftop, just take some time and we'll let you know if we hear anything." He didn't look at them but he nodded his head.

* * *

" _You're my world."_ They stood there for a long time just holding each other.

"Why did you hang up?" His voice sounded so broken as he whispered it softly in her ear.

She'd learned over the years to disconnect her emotions from the job but she'd come so close to completely losing it when she heard Deeks' voice on the other side of the phone this afternoon. Then she thought about everything she could have lost and couldn't hold back the sob that raked her body. The weight of the day hitting her for the first time right in this moment.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." It came out in parts as she couldn't seem to catch her breath.

"Hey, we're okay." He couldn't keep his own tears from finally falling. "Baby, we're okay, we're together. You're safe." He lifted her head from his shoulder to look in her eyes. The tears were falling down her cheeks and she wasn't trying to stop it.

"Tell me what happened?" He was angry but he didn't know the whole story behind the day's events yet.

She wiped her hand over her nose. "They wanted us to talk to them, to convince them not to launch."

He needed to know everything that had happened for his mind to calm down. "Who's us?"

"The family or friends of the Air Force officers. It was me and his sister for Kevin."

"She must've been scared."

She nodded. "She was terrified and freaking out. I tried to connect with her on every level to get her to trust me, to get her to calm down."

"Was that his only family?"

"Mhm, his parents and grandparents are dead but he has a nephew, his sister has a two month old son, I couldn't let her get hurt." A new set of tears came. "She wasn't responsible for any of it."

"I know." He pulled her closer, to comfort her, laying her head on his shoulder.

"It worked at first." He wasn't sure what she was referring to. "Kevin was talking to her and then he started to feel remorse but… the connection stopped so I had to go in."

"What do you mean?" He rubbed circles on her back.

"I had to enter the launch control center that Ross and Kevin were in, through this small tunnel and I just threw a grenade in. It was so claustrophobic and then I had to wait for them to get me back out, and just stood there, I felt like I couldn't breath." She felt like she was back in that room again, her breath getting uneven.

"Come here." He pulled her closer again.

"They were dead." She could barely utter the words. She would have wanted to save Kevin from getting killed but that didn't happen.

"How long did it take for them to get you out?"

"I… I don't know. I'm sure it felt longer than it was."

"You're safe now." He tried to comfort her.

"And his sister… she looked so disappointed in me." Her mind kept recollecting different events of the day.

"No, Kens, you couldn't have done any more to save him. You had to take two lives two save millions. I understand why you did it Kensi, I really do, but it's so hard..." He had to take a breath. "It's so hard to think about what could've gone wrong." She nodded. She'd been spinning all those thoughts through her mind all day. "When I heard what could happen to you if they launched, all I wanted was for you to be right here with me, not anywhere near that place. Just to hold you in my arms, look into your beautiful eyes and hear your sweet voice… again."

She looked into his blue eyes. The sadness and worry very clear. "I'm sorry and I'm also sorry for being mad at you about the stupid grilled cheese."

"No, I'm sorry. I was frustrated and out of line. All the stupid fights about the little things or misunderstandings are just so irrelevant after today."

"You know that I always love you no matter what argument we're having." She moved a strand of hair out of his face. "I don't say that enough."

"Hey, I know." He nodded his head slightly. "And I know that you know, that the same goes for me. We may not always say it but we know how much we love each other. Okay?" She agreed. "We'll always love each other…" She leaned in and kissed him before he could say more. It was gentle and full of love. When she pulled back she then folded her arms around her body and looked out at the views from the rooftops. "You cold?"

She nodded. "I'm shaking." It was a mixture of the cold breeze from standing on the roof and the tension of everything that had happened today.

"We should head home and I think we should take tomorrow off. Just spend time together."

She nodded again. "I'd like that." She said softly and then he pulled her into one last hug before they headed home.

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	8. Chapter 8 (9x8)

Thank you for all the reviews, favorites and follows! I loved this week's episode! 200 episodes, that's crazy! Can I just say that Momma Deeks looked very stylish in this episode? The interaction between Deeks and Roberta was hilarious. She wants grand babies :)

I added a short scene between Eric and Nell with just the two of them because we haven't gotten a lot of Neric scenes yet this season.

I also wrote a thanksgiving scene with the Moms. Happy (day-after) Thanksgiving everyone!

This chapter is even longer than the last one! By about a 1000 words more! I just couldn't stop writing.

This picks up after the eighth episode of season 9, _This Is What We Do_ (9x8).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

"I wanna go home." She was still facing Asakeem.

"Yeah, we'll leave right after we're finished here."

She turned around so she was facing him. "No, I want to leave now."

"Okay." Deeks walked over to Sam and Callen. "Do you guys need anymore help cleaning this up?"

They watched Kensi head towards the car already. "No, we've got it covered."

Deeks turned to see what they were looking at and saw that she wasn't right behind him like he expected. "Thanks."

The ride home was completely silent. He was letting her compose her thoughts from today. She obviously still had a lot anger about what Asakeem had caused but he knew she was trying to piece everything together in her mind.

It wasn't completely dark out but when they walked up to their front porch the porch-light went on automatically. He flipped through his keys to find the right one and then opened the door.

They stepped inside and he locked the door again. When he turned around he saw her still standing where she had stepped in, facing away from him.

"Hey, you okay?" He touched her arm slightly.

She shrugged her shoulders. "Definitely not how I wanted to spend my Sunday." He turned her around so he could fully look at her and then he could see that tears were starting to come. "I'm sorry."

She was trying very hard not to let her tears fall. "Kens, you don't have to be sorry for being emotional."

"This is happening way too often lately." She was talking about the tears that seemed to come after every case.

"It's gonna be as often as you need to express yourself. You can't keep it all in." He reassured her.

"How can you not be angry at him anymore?"

That was a hard question to answer. He didn't know why but it just didn't seem as important to be angry. "Because you're okay and that's all I need to be worried about. We have to let go of things or they will just eat us alive. We both know that."

"If it hadn't happened we might've been married by now Deeks, or at the least set a date." She can't help but feel like she'd lost a better part of a year of her life when she was recovering from the accident. When she'd found out that he'd bought the ring before the whole accident had occurred, it only confirmed those thoughts.

"It doesn't matter when we do it, it's going to happen. We can set a date right now Kens."

"That's not the point."

"Then what is the point?" She didn't answer his question. "Hey, look at me." He touched her cheek softly to move her head so she was facing him. "I think some things happen for a reason. And I know those 7 or so months were really hard on…"

"Both of us." She intervened. She was always making sure she included everyone even though it affected her the most.

"Yes, both of us. It has helped us communicate more and that has brought us closer together." He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her cheek.

"Why did you say the wedding date would be the 29th of February?"

He laughed. "I don't know."

"Why are you and your Mom so sarcastic to each other all the time? Especially you, why do you always have to make it like everything she says is wrong?"

"She often is wrong." She gave him a look. "Why are you asking so many questions?"

"Because…" She didn't finish the sentence.

He sighed deeply. "I don't know. She often just exaggerates stories, makes things up or doesn't quite understand the whole picture. Rather than explaining it, I just joke back."

"She's trying. She doesn't always understand what we do cause you don't call her enough and then when we do get together, we have to leave."

"I know."

"You don't how lucky you are that we actually had a case today."

"What? Why?"

"Cause you lied to your Mom. Why did we have to leave so quickly?"

"You know why." He said quickly. It was true, she did know why he didn't want to stay for breakfast with his Mom and Guy.

"Deeks… they seemed really cute together and he seemed very nice." He let out a huge sigh. Yes, Guy had been nothing but nice to him but he hadn't made a very good first impression. "He's a good friend to her."

"Is he though, cause I don't even know him?"

"That's cause you're not giving him a chance. We left before we could get to know him. I didn't even get to eat my breakfast." She pouted jokingly.

He was going to take this opportunity and change the topic. "What were you going to have?"

"An omelet with a fruit cup on the side."

"Since when are you into all the healthy stuff, huh? You always like chocolate or sugar with your food. You're the queen of unhealthy foods."

She gave him a look. "I'm just more aware of what I'm eating."

"Okay, if you say so."

"You were great with the boy today."

He didn't know why she changed the topic to that now. "So were you."

She huffed an amused laugh. She wasn't good at all. "You knew exactly what he needed, you always know what everyone needs. A burger, I didn't even think about that." It was the connection with the unhealthy food.

"Kens, that's fine. You found him, who knows how long he would have been there if you hadn't? Then he would have been alone. You did good today."

"I can't imagine what he had to see. It's horrible."

"It really is. No kid should ever have to see that."

"The world can be a scary place sometimes."

"It can also be a happy place." He was trying to bring her out of this somber mood. "You're going to be an amazing Mom one day, Kens. When the time is right." She nodded, when they were ready it would happen.

They stood there in sweet silence, until he thought about the morning again. It just wouldn't leave his mind. "Why couldn't my Mom just come without him?"

She could tell that this was weighing heavily on him. "She wants to share this with you because she's happy."

"Why so soon?"

"You don't know how long they've been friends Deeks. He knew about our engagement, she has someone to talk to. This is a good thing." She was frustrated that he wouldn't even hear his mother out.

He nodded. "Just like you with Asakeem, I'm trying… but it's gonna take some time."

* * *

Nell walked into OSP where she knew Eric was still working. He was sitting in his chair doing something on his tablet. "Hey, you ready to go?" He said as he looked up.

She stopped in front of him. "Mhm."

He sensed there was something going on. "You okay?"

"Yeah."

"Did Sidney leave already?"

"Yeah, she had a lot of work to finish up."

"Everything okay between you guys?" He was worried because Nell seemed very irritated earlier when they spoke about her sister.

"Uhm, yeah." The truth was she wasn't sure how she felt about it. Her sister had just admitted she'd been hard on her her whole life but it was to prepare her for the real world. She knew that it hadn't been handled in the best way.

"Nell?"

She let out a big breath that she didn't realize she was holding in. "She told me why she was so tough on me as a kid."

"What was her reason?"

"She wanted me to be tougher than her cause the world isn't safe for women. Here I am doing a semi-dangerous job sometimes, look how that worked out."

"You are tougher than her Nell. You should have seen her reaction when you stopped those guys. She was impressed, she wouldn't have been able to do that." She didn't say anything. "I was impressed as well. I'm very proud."

He leaned in to give her a hug and she fully embraced it. "Thank you." It wasn't just for the compliment he gave her but also for being supportive all day.

"We got through the day together." He remembered her words from earlier.

She smiled. "We sure did."

They let go of each other and he went to grab his bag. "So Penelope where to?"

She cringed. "Ah please don't call me that."

"You really don't like it?"

"Nope."

"Well I do, but just so you know it doesn't matter what your name is, you're still going to be the same smart, funny and beautiful woman that I get to work with everyday." He moved a strand of hair from her face, behind her ear.

That made her smile again and blush slightly. He was the sweetest guy she'd ever met. He always knew what she needed. "Can we go to my place?" She asked softly.

"Of course." He pointed towards the exit. "Lead the way, Togo."

She playfully pushed his arm. "Don't call me that." She walked ahead of him with the bag on her shoulder.

"Velma? Nellverine? Nellie?"

That made her laugh. "No."

* * *

"Hi, Momma, come on in." She stepped into the house with bags filled of food. "We don't have the pleasure of seeing Guy today?"

"No Martin. He already had plans." He didn't want to sound too happy but he was. He'd hoped it would just be the moms. "Hi, Kensi, happy Thanksgiving." Roberta gave her a hug. It was something they did every time they saw each other now.

"Happy Thanksgiving."

"Hi Julia, how are you?" Roberta walked into the kitchen and gave her a hug. Julia was already very busy preparing some of the food.

"I'm good, how are you?"

"I'm great."

Kensi sat back down on the barstool. "Is there anything we can do to help?"

"No, I think we've got it."

"Alright."

Roberta put her bags down in the kitchen and got out lots of ingredients. The Moms were going full out on the meal again this year. They'd learned to work together by dividing and conquering the different dishes. "You guys made the pie right?"

They both looked at each other panicked. "What?"

She laughed. "I'm just kidding, I know I can't trust you guys with making the pumpkin pie."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence Mom."

"Did you prepare the turkey though?" They had been trusted to do that because it needed to cook longer than the rest.

"Yes, it's been in the oven for a couple hours already."

"How'd that go?"

"I think it's good but we shall see."

"I'm sure it'll taste great Kens." Julia said.

The Moms were working hard as Kensi and Deeks watched. They'd opened a bottle of wine and filled glasses for everyone.

"Thank you both for making this, it already looks delicious." Deeks said.

"We all know you invite us to cook here, in your home, so you guys can keep the leftovers." Roberta stated.

"I plead the fifth." Kensi raised her eyebrows, showing her fake innocence. She did love Thanksgiving leftovers.

They all moved to sit down at the table, all the food was prepared and either in the oven or on the counter waiting for everything else to be done.

"So how are things going with your trainer?" Kensi asked. She was curious because she and Deeks had talked to Roberta about keeping fit and Deeks had suggested a trainer. It hadn't turned out exactly how he had expected or wanted it to go but she had followed his advice.

"Oh yeah, how is it?" Julia added. Deeks was shocked that she seemed to know about it as well.

"It's great. He's been working me very hard." Deeks made a sound that showed his discomfort. He couldn't even look at her. "Oh please Martin, I'm talking about the workouts."

"In the bedroom?" He retorted.

She glared at him. "No, we usually go down to the beach or just workout in the garden."

"Do you guys have a set routine or is it different every time?" Julia asked.

"He has different circuits I can choose from." They sort of started their own side conversation leaving Kensi and Deeks out of it.

Kensi and Deeks looked at each other and she could see the turmoil in this face. She grabbed onto his hand and spoke softly. "Deeks."

He gave her a look and they didn't even have to speak for her to know how uncomfortable he was with his Mom having a boyfriend.

"Yesterday was a really hard workout, I was exhausted afterwards." Roberta spoke to everyone again.

"Well I think it's great that you're doing that."

"Thank you Kensi." She was glad one of them thought so. "He's also been a good friend."

Kensi squeezed Deeks' hand. "I'm glad."

"How was that case you guys had this week?"

"It was good. It's all finished up." Deeks decided to speak again leaving the boyfriend-topic behind.

"Don't you guys find it annoying that you can get called in at any time?" She asked them. "We were going to have breakfast when they got called in on a Sunday." She said sharing her frustrations with Julia.

"It just comes with the job." Deeks said. He didn't always love the timing but he'd been particularly happy that day because they had an excuse to leave.

"You guys ever think about leaving the job?" Roberta asked while she was stirring the mashed potatoes.

They looked at each other. "Sometimes." Kensi answered. "But we just don't know yet."

"Have you guys made any progress on what we talked about?"

"What did we talk about?" He had no clue what she was referring to with this sudden topic change.

"Having the grandchildren?"

"Mom…"

"You guys are trying?" Julia seemed way too happy about that.

"No, no we're not." Deeks said loudly.

"Well when are you going to start?"

Kensi grabbed her glass of wine and took a huge sip. She was letting Deeks handle the situation. "We're not sure."

"Nobody's getting any younger you know."

"Oh my god." His joking voice was completely gone.

"You guys do want to have kids don't you?"

"Yes we do, but we're taking things slow, step by step. First we have a wedding to plan then we'll think about the rest. Now can we please stop talking about this." He wasn't going to share with their mothers, the numerous conversations they've had about children, the future and their jobs.

"Alright."

Just as the silence was getting awkward, the timer went off indicating that some of the food in the oven was ready. Moments later the table was filled with way too much food for the four of them.

"This looks so good." Kensi said excitedly as she looked at the food. They all sat down, ready to dig in when Julia stopped them.

"We have to say thanks." She insisted. "I'll start. I'm thankful for my family and friends, my safe home, my stable job and my beautiful daughter." She grabbed onto Kensi's hand. "Who has found the most incredible man to marry and I'm so thankful that my baby girl is back to herself this year." She gave her Mom a small smile and squeezed her hand before letting go again.

"Alright, my turn." Roberta started. "I'm thankful for my family and my friends, Guy." This time Deeks didn't say anything, he just listened. "My amazing future daughter-in-law and my extraordinary son, I am so thankful that you guys come home safely every time." She ended her sentence softly.

"Love you Mom."

"Kens." Her Mom prompted her.

"Uhm…" She felt slightly self-conscious being sentimental in front of everyone but she just went for it. "I'm thankful for the delicious-looking food on this table, our beautiful home, Monty, my family and friends, both the Moms here together with us today and Deeks. My best friend who I can trust with anything and everything and always knows exactly what I need." She ended looking at him.

He grabbed onto her hand and didn't let go when he started to speak. "I'm thankful for my Mom, my soon-to-be mother-in-law, Monty, my friends at work and…" He turned to Kensi. "I'm thankful that we met about…8 years ago. Wow the time has gone by so fast." He tugged her hand. "I'm thankful that you're here today, Kens. A year ago you were still struggling to gain movement in your hand and now you're happy and healthy, sitting next to me alive." She knew he wasn't just talking about the crash last year but also last week when she had come close to not coming home. They usually didn't tell their Moms about those types of events because they didn't want them to worry but last year there was no way around telling them about the accident because she spent months in the hospital.

She leaned in and they kissed each other on the lips. It wasn't a long kiss but long enough to make them blush slightly when they pulled apart. They didn't do that often in front of others, showing too much affection, but they both knew that they needed that right now. They looked at each other, their hearts filled with love, until Kensi turned towards the Moms and spoke. "Okay, it's time to eat."

He chuckled. "Of course Kensi's mind goes straight to food."

"Well I've been looking forward to this for weeks."

She started scooping some stuffing onto his plate and he stood up to cut the turkey. "Is that why you've been eating so healthy lately? Saving all of it for this meal?"

Everybody laughed at their banter. "Maybe and don't forget the leftovers for days to come."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	9. Chapter 9 (9x9)

Thank you so much for all the favorites, follows and reviews! I was not expecting what happened at the end of the episode. How could she walk away from her family? That gave me a lot to think about with Kensi and Deeks and their future.

Of course Deeks' Mom is giving Kensi binders of wedding plans to look at. Kensi seemed to want to start planning the wedding in the last episode so Roberta is taking action.

I think that nobody but Callen knows that Joelle didn't really die, so I wrote it like that.

I'm sorry it took a little longer to finish, my ideas were all over the place for this episode.

This picks up after the ninth episode of season 9, _Fool Me Twice_ (9x9).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

He woke up and saw that Kensi was already out of bed. It was still early in the morning, much too early for her to be up. With the days getting shorter as it neared the holiday season, it was still dark out. Not finding her in the bathroom he went out into the hall.

He walked downstairs and saw her sitting at the dining room table with her knees up to her chest. She was holding a mug in her hand and she was staring straight ahead obviously deep in thought. It reminded him of the many times he'd found her like this in the past year. The same time last year, she was having trouble sleeping through the night because of the accident.

He approached her slowly and spoke softly because he didn't want to startle her. "Hey."

"Hey." He kissed her on the top of her head and went to get himself a cup of coffee.

"You're up early." He stated not wanting to seem too worried.

"Yeah, I couldn't sleep." Getting a cup out of the cupboard, he poured himself a cup coffee. "That's gonna be cold." He tasted it and made a face.

"Cold." He stated lamely. She chuckled to herself and shook her head as he started a new pot. "Means you've been up a while." He took a seat across from her. "Something wrong?"

"No, just a weird dream and then I couldn't fall back asleep so I decided to get up."

"What was it about?"

"Uh, it was about Jack, we were at the altar…" She paused to see his reaction. "But when he put the ring on my finger, it turned into a spider and then I woke up."

"Wow." He was surprised that she was thinking about that.

"Yep, it was definitely weird."

"What do you think it means?"

"I don't think it means anything." She was telling him so there wouldn't be any secrets between them, not so he could obsess about the meaning.

"But why would you be thinking about that?"

"Deeks, I'm not thinking about that or him. It was just a dream."

"Okay." He waited a moment but then decided he had more to say. "You don't think the presence of ex-boyfriends or wedding plans have an influence on your dreams."

"Oh my god." He was going to make this a bigger deal than it was.

"Maybe we should look up what it all means."

"No, Deeks."

"I think we should."

The coffee machine dinged indicating that a new pot was ready. He was going to need the caffeine for the long day ahead.

* * *

They walked out of the mission and into the cool breeze of the night. There was a sadness surrounding them as they stopped at their cars. They had all known Joelle a long time but their trust had been lost when she deceived Callen and was part of the rogue CIA group. The group that Sullivan or Ferris was in when he took Kensi hostage. But that didn't mean that it didn't affect them.

Kensi and Deeks had spent most of the day with Joelle's husband and son in the boatshed and it saddened them to think that they had just lost their wife and mother.

"I feel sorry for her husband and son. They shouldn't have to go through this." Deeks broke the silence.

"It's so sad for her son. He's so young." Nell said. It was always sad when kids were involved.

"He's such a great kid." He said solemnly. His voice was full of emotion. He'd spent time with the boy today, seeing how kind and innocent he was.

They stood there in silence again, not quite knowing what to say.

"Why'd she go back into the building? She could have walked away." Eric asked but not expecting anyone to have an answer. If they could just turn back the time and tell her not to go, everything would be okay. But the reality is that it isn't.

Kensi had yet to say anything and Deeks was worried. He reached down to hold her hand and as if it was an immediate reaction he could see her eyes glaze over. She turned away from Eric and Nell slightly not wanting them to see her like this but she knew it was pointless.

"We can never bring a child into this life with this job." She whispered to Deeks.

"I know. I don't understand how someone can put their child through that. Disappear for days without a real explanation as to why. It's horrible."

"It's too dangerous." She said, her voice wavering. Eric and Nell silently listened to Kensi and Deeks sharing their concerns. "Why does this keep happening?" The full force of reality was hitting her, all the consequences this job could have. First Michelle and now Joelle.

"I don't know. I don't know why things like this happen." He composed his thoughts. "But we all have to be thankful that we are going home safe tonight." It could be any of them at anytime when they come across their suspects.

* * *

They'd come home, eaten a fast dinner, showered and put their pj's on. They were now in the living room trying to unwind from the day but it was proving to be hard. He was watching tv and Kensi was busy trying to find anything to do that would keep her mind off today.

He looked over and watched as she flipped through the binders his mother had brought them. She hadn't talked to him much about their wedding but he could tell that she was excited. He'd seen her looking at little things related to weddings when she thought he wasn't looking. She'd been dropping hints, asking him about the plans whenever someone else brought up the topic but had yet to ask him directly when they were alone.

Deciding to show some interest, he turned off the tv and walked over to her. He pointed towards the binders. "You doing some wedding planning?" He took a seat next to her.

She chuckled a little. "No, I'm already overwhelmed. If this is only for flowers then what is the rest going to be?"

"Well we have to start somewhere right?" He took one of the binders and started turning the pages. "Oh, I like these." He pointed to the light pink flowers on the page.

"You're on the third page, you can't just choose the first thing you see."

"What? I'm not. I like these flowers."

"They're pink."

"So? There's nothing wrong with pink, it's a nice color." She didn't respond as she went through another binder that was in front of her. She had absolutely no idea where to start with the wedding plans. Even if she was overwhelmed by the binders Roberta was giving her and Roberta did tend to get a little too excited about this, she was relieved that she was getting help. Also that someone seemed to get the ball rolling on this topic. Roberta may have wanted to go a little faster by suggesting grandchildren last week but at least progress was being made.

"What about these? They're blue, some might even say cornflower blue." He gave her his signature smile and that made her smile as well.

She took a closer look at the flowers he was pointing at. "I like them."

"Okay, we have one option." He went back to looking through the binder. There were so many different arrangements. She sat back in her chair and let out a sigh and he sensed that she was upset about more than just flowers. "You okay?"

She nodded. "Yeah, I just keep thinking about her family."

He knew immediately that she was talking about Joelle again. "Me too." He looked at her face filled with sadness.

"I'm so tired." Not just tired from the day, but tired of the darkness of this job.

"Let's go to bed." He said softly, then stood up and tugged her along.

They got into bed and Kensi gravitated towards his side. She just wanted to have him close to her so she put her head on his shoulder and wrapped her arm around his stomach. She spoke so softly that he could barely hear her. "I don't want our child to lose a parent to this job."

He matched her tone. "Me neither. Helping other people's families is amazing but it's not worth the risk of losing ours." She nodded her head against his chest.

"When I was talking to Nick he said that Joelle had become distant because of her job. She couldn't talk about classified cases with him so she shut him out completely. We can't have one of us working at NCIS and the other one not, we would be keeping secrets from each other and later on we would stop communicating altogether, I can't go back to that." He sensed that she wasn't done talking so he just listened. "And then with what happened today… I feel like every case is telling us that we should stop doing this, but I just don't know…" It felt like a warning, between Michelle and Joelle it became clear that this job was not suitable for the family life they wanted. "Single parent… I know Sam is doing a great parenting job under the circumstances and my Dad definitely stepped up when my Mom left and you said your Mom did everything to make sure you got what you needed but I just don't want that."

"Nobody ever wants that. It makes me think how lucky we are to come home every night. I'm so much more aware of it now, even just in these last few months, that I want a future and I actually look forward to it. The more I think about it, the more I realize that maybe we should just walk into Mosley's fancy new office and resign before it's too late." She stayed silent going over his words in her head. Every time they talked about quitting, it was sometime in the near future but now it seemed much closer. The dangers in general, the shoot-outs, explosions and the enemies they've made over the years should be enough for them to call it quits but even that isn't always safe as they saw with Michelle. "I want to come home to my wife…" He tugged her closer. "And my children from my safe job, where I can eat dinner with them and read them bedtime stories and I'm not working late, worrying about crazy things."

"You're gonna be such a good Dad, Deeks."

"I hope so."

"I can't wait to watch you play basketball with our kid."

"I'll teach my son all the tricks."

She lifted her head to look at him. "Hey, a girl can play basketball too."

She laid her head back down. "I know, but I recall someone saying they'd be a good mom to a boy." She didn't look up at him this time, slightly embarrassed. He kissed the top of her head. "Hetty told me once that I can have all the expectations I want when I have children, but I can never predict who I'm going to end up with."

"I remember that." It was before they had ever talked about the possibility of having kids together.

"She's right. We don't know what's to come, but we can enjoy what we get in the moment."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	10. Chapter 10 (9x10)

Thank you so much for your continuous support and positivity! I had all intentions of keeping this chapter light and fun but again there were just too many hints for them not to have a deep conversation when they reunited at the end of the day.

There were two weeks between episodes and I had finals this week so I feel like I haven't posted in forever but here is the next chapter! I've already started writing the next chapter for the Christmas episode so that should be up soon as well but incase it isn't, I want wish you all Happy Holidays!

This picks up after the tenth episode of season 9, _Forasteira_ (9x10).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

She followed him into the burn room. "Deeks, no, baby." The oven was starting up.

"Hey." She snatched the sketchbook out of his hands and closed it, then turned and shut off the oven.

"Deeks, you can't do that."

"Oh I most certainly can and I will." He made a grab for it again.

"No." She said adamantly. "This isn't yours."

"It's my Mom." He argued.

"Deeks, how many times do I have to tell you that your Mom is an adult who can make decisions on her own?"

"Ehh." He sounded like he was debating the amount.

She was shocked that he wasn't accepting it. "Deeks!"

He loved the way she said his name. The name he loved to be called. Guy had tried to call him Marty and Martin but _Deeks_ is what he truly liked to hear. Especially from her. "I love that you call me that."

"What? Deeks?" She was confused by what he meant and the sudden change in topic.

"Mhm."

"That's what everyone calls you right? It's what you want?" She didn't want to hear that he prefered to be called something else all this time.

"Yeah, it is. It just sounds best coming from you." He said sincerely.

She smiled. "Let's go Romeo." She didn't want to get all mushy at work so she decided to make a joke and turn around to leave.

"Now see, that's not my name." He called after her.

They walked to their desks and she packed up her bag. She stood in front of him and handed him the sketchbook. "Are we going to drop that off at Guy's tonight?" She pointed to the bag he was holding.

"No, I was going to do it tomorrow."

She put a hand on his chest, stopping him from leaving the bullpen. "You're not going to snoop around on his computer are you?"

"No!" He said quickly. "There are videos you know, workout ones. I don't want to see that." After a beat of her staredown, he crumbled. "I was hoping you could."

"No, no! That is not happening. That's private."

"Oh I'm aware, that's why I need you to watch and delete any that are inappropriate."

"I'm not doing that and neither are you. Gimme that." She took the bag from him. "I will keep this until we drop it off before work tomorrow."

"Fine. I'll let it go..."

"Thank you."

"For now." He said partially out of truth and partially just to get her reaction. She glared at him and all he could do was laugh. "If I understood you correctly, you said something involving pizza?"

"Mhm."

"For dinner?"

"Yes. I'm so hungry."

"Alright, we'll pick that up quickly and then get some ice on that pretty face yours."

He drove her car on this rare occasion, arguing that she just needed to relax. He stopped for pizza and then continued on home. She was silently thankful that he had insisted on driving, her face was starting to hurt more and more and her concentration was just gone for the day.

They entered their home and Monty greeted them right away. "Careful Monty. Your Mommy's injured." He shooed the dog away from them and put the pizza on the coffee table. "You sit down and I'll get plates and ice-packs." He made sure she sat on the couch and didn't follow him.

Monty couldn't stay away for long and came over to Kensi. "Hi there, boy. Did you have a good day?" She rubbed his head. "Mine wasn't the greatest." She admitted softly.

"How many ice-packs do you need? Just for the face?" He had the freezer open looking at the multiple ice-packs they had for exactly these moments. They didn't get very injured most of the time, but sometimes they would get an occasional bruise.

"Uh, yeah that's fine." She hesitated wondering if she should worry him with more injuries.

He came over again with everything. "Don't want my Mom to see you like this." He pointed at her face. "Guy said she worries about us and the job. Can't have her panicking." He handed her two ice-packs and placed the plates in front of them.

Deciding she wanted to eat first while the pizza was hot, she went to put the ice-packs against her stomach. She lifted her shirt a little to lay it between the bandages and her shirt.

"Oh my god, Kens." He lifted her shirt up again to see her whole stomach bandaged.

"I'm fine Deeks, Sam wrapped it up. Just going to be bruised tomorrow." She tried to reassure him.

"How big was this guy?" He had genuine worry in his voice.

"Not a guy but a woman."

"What?"

"A highly skilled woman." She stated matter of factly. "One moment I had my gun pointed at her about to cuff her, the next I'm getting kneed in the stomach and face and thrown into a wall."

"Wow." He could tell she was a little shaken. "I know that's disappointing."

"She had the upper-hand, I think I was just so shocked in the beginning. Then I got back up again and fought back but…"

"But what?" Her hand went to touch her neck but she wasn't speaking. He looked at her and then moved her hand away from her neck. He gently touched the slight red line that was going around it. "Kens… did she choke you?"

She nodded. "She used this plastic wrap that was hanging at the warehouse and I tried to get up faster but she locked me in and got away."

He was surprised to hear that someone had overpowered her, especially someone like her. "But you got her, right?"

"Yeah, eventually." She looked defeated. "She could've killed me." It dawned on her for the second time today.

"That could happen any day. That's what this job is." It didn't sound very sympathetic but it was the truth.

"I know." She said frustratedly. This job meant everything to her and she thought she was the best at it, but today someone had actually beat her. She relied on her training but she'd been thrown off her game. The woman was smarter, stronger and faster than her… okay that was a little exaggerated, she was sure she could take Pietra down if she had to again but not today. "I… I just don't know what else to do."

"I know, I know you don't."

She didn't know how to continue. That was the problem she didn't have an answer for him or for herself. "I can't help but think what would have happened if my father hadn't died or if I hadn't been so angry about it, what I would be doing with my life now."

"But it did happen Kens, and it's who you are. That's what make you, you. You fight to protect others. That's what you wanted to do, why you picked this job. Same for me, I wanted to help people who couldn't fend for themselves."

"I talked about him today, to talk her down." He thought she was talking about her father but he wasn't completely sure. "Her father was murdered as well and she was trying to get revenge."

"She's a lot like you." He observed.

She nodded her head. "And she spoke Portuguese." She said smiling. It had been a long time since she'd used her Portuguese at work.

"That's cool."

"Yeah."

He knew it had been a very long and draining day for her. "I'm sorry I wasn't there today."

"Hey, you had detecting to do." That made him smile.

"Yeah well, it wasn't my best find."

"At least Guy can get it all back. It's not in the wrong hands." She reassured him.

"Way to look on the positive side."

"It is."

He continued. "You can just see how well these workouts are going for her. How much do you think she's actually exercising?"

"I'm sure she's doing some but then he's just spending time with her probably on his own time without pay."

"It better be without pay. You can't buy friendships." He was quiet and she wondered what what going on in his head. He let out a deep sigh. "Guy said he loved my Mom."

She hadn't expected that, especially with the whole bag, drawing and video ordeal. "Wow. That's huge Deeks." He nodded slowly. "He really cares about her and she needs that, she deserves that, she deserves to be happy."

"I know… she does." He was starting to accept it ever so slightly. He opened the lid to the pizza and put one piece on each of their plates. "One piece okay to start?"

"Sure." He handed it to her and then moved himself further back on the couch to get comfortable. "Guy's actually a pretty good artist." He groaned but then laughed. "I'm just saying, it's very realistic." She said as she started eating her pizza.

"Just keep rubbing it in." He spoke jokingly. "When I got there he was meditating, he works out and draws, he likes healthy foods. It's the complete opposite of my Mom."

"Well opposites attract I guess. Look at us, one is strong, intelligent and good-looking. That's me." She made sure to get her point across and he could barely keep in his laugh. "And the other is scruffy, goofy and a neat-freak." She finished.

"Are you implying that you're messy?"

"I never said that."

"You love me for me, just the way I am."

"I do."

"And I love you just the way you are." He said lovingly. "Even if there are some things that need tweaking."

Her jaw dropped. "You're one to talk."

"I realize I do talk a lot."

"Stop changing my words."

"I tend to do that."

"Oh I've noticed." Their quick jokes died down as they ate their pizza but then she thought about something. "You were gone all day, what did you guys do?"

"I didn't spend the whole day with him but I asked what had happened then called in to make a report, we chatted a little longer and finally, I went to pick it up at the department of stolen property."

"What did you guys talk about besides workouts and art?"

"Stop!" She was tormenting him by repeating it. He knew he was being a little dramatic but he just couldn't help it. "Guy reminded me of the different departments in the LAPD that there are. Some way less dangerous ones."

She stopped mid-bite and put her pizza down. "Is that what you want to do though?"

He also lowered his pizza and looked at her. "What I want is a family and a future, if that means doing a semi-boring job so that I can come home safe, uninjured and on time, then I'd be okay with that."

She was taken aback by his honesty. They were talking about major life changes, changes in the dynamic of their relationship. The reality was hitting her hard. "I want to be partners."

"We are partners and we'd stay partners… at home."

"I know but it's not the same." He knew that but life was going to have to change eventually.

"Everything will work out." He pulled her head closer so he could lean in and kiss her.

"Did you just touch your greasy pizza fingers to my hair?"

"I was giving you love." He mock defended.

She smiled softly. "Are you thirsty? Do you want a beer?" She moved to get up.

"No, no, no." He pushed her back down. "You sit down I'll get it?"

"I can do it myself."

"But you don't have to."

"You don't have to smother me Deeks. I'm fine."

"Did you want a beer?" He ignored what she said completely.

Given that he was already in the kitchen, she gave in. "No, just a glass of water." She didn't think she could take alcohol very well right now.

He came back with her glass of water and a beer for himself, handing it to her he could see her defiant face. "Here you go."

"I could've gotten it myself."

"A nice _thank you_ would do." He still saw unease in her eyes. "Just let me pamper my fiancée for one night."

"Thank you." She said finally and took a sip.

"Oh, speaking of drinks, I don't know what weird healthy things Guy likes but he wanted a mango smoothie so I was like, I'll have one too then. Guess what? Fourteen dollars. Who pays fourteen dollars for a smoothie?" He shook his head and picked up one of the ice-packs and held it up to her cheek. "Apparently I do. Can't believe I agreed to that."

"That's expensive. Was it good?"

"It was really good but it's still a ridiculous price."

"Yeah, I'd never pay fourteen dollars for a drink."

"Uhm, you made me pay 50 dollars for your Partida Elegante Anejo shot."

"I can't believe you still remember the name."

"Of course I do, it was a double shot, so it was actually a 100 dollars for your drink."

"You're the one that bought it, not me. Besides it was from the budget for the case."

"Touché. Although I must say I was trying to maintain my cover and impress you."

She loved his charm. "You're very cute."

"So I've been told."

"Didn't mean to give you that much of an egoboost."

"Yet somehow you did." Monty was right next to the pizza box when he looked over. "Monty! Don't eat the pizza." Deeks put down the ice-pack and tugged him over to him. "I know Kensi lets you eat human-foods sometimes, but you're not supposed to."

"He likes the food I feed him." She reached closer to Deeks so she could pet Monty but then slightly recoiled. "Ow!" Her hand went to her stomach.

"You okay?"

Easing back into her initial position on the couch, she nodded. "I'm fine."

He let the 'fine' slide this time. "You wanna take a bath?'

"Yeah, I think that'd be good."

"Some epsom salts? Some candles? Some peaceful music? Maybe I'll even join you." He said seductively tempting her.

"That sounds perfect."

He stood up but still leaned over her. He put his arms around her shoulder and under both her knees. "Ah. Deeks, you don't have to carry me, I can walk." Monty starting barking and jumping around.

"I need to take care of my ladybird." Monty lifted his paws up on Deeks' legs. "Monty down."

"You're gonna hurt your back."

"No, I'm not." He dismissed her.

"Deeks…" There it was again, his name spoken so beautifully by her.

"Will it hurt too much if I kiss you?" He whispered cutting her off.

She smiled, what a way to stop her arguing. "It's worth the sacrifice." He leaned in and gently touched his lips to hers. He didn't want to cause her any more pain than she was already in but he needed the contact. He wishes he had been there for her today, alongside her, fighting for justice.

He leaned in again kissing her forehead and made a promise. "I'll always try to protect you."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	11. Chapter 11 (9x11)

Thank you so much for the comments, favs and follows! I have literally been working on this all day and that's just to finish it. I've been working on this chapter for weeks but am finally finished. I had huge tests after the winter break but I'm now done so I have 3 weeks without homework or obligations. I hope to post some other stories because they've been months in the making and I really want to share them.

I'm so behind on these chapters. It's probably because I make them much too long but it just happens! This chapter is over 5000 words which is crazy and the most it's ever been because I got a little carried away. I just watched tonight's episode and have also started that chapter. So I have the next two partly started but just like for this chapter that doesn't promise a speedy post, sorry.

It's complicated to write scenes with lots of people in them. I tried to give them all equal amounts of attention but of course that didn't happen because I just find some characters easier to write. I hope some of the transitions aren't too confusing because I didn't put page breaks some places since it all occurs in the same room but let me know if I should. There is an add-on part for the episode and then a sort of Christmas bonus (weeks after Christmas).

This picks up after the eleventh episode of season 9, _All Is Bright_ (9x11).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

"Where's Callen going?" Deeks asked as he watched Callen leave the mission.

"He had something to do." Sam said.

That seemed like a vague answer but he just let it go. "Alright."

"Well the decorations look beautiful and the eggnog is delicious." Kensi held up her cup to Nell.

"Really good." Sam added.

"Thanks." Nell said.

"It feels good to celebrate once in awhile." Sam said sincerely. The year had been incredibly hard and they needed some time to celebrate the good.

"Cheers to that."

"Cheers!" The group said collectively.

"I'm glad I'm back this year." Kensi looked at the group.

"Yeah but you came for the party last year." Sam commented remembering that she had come after the party had started.

"I know but I didn't really feel like part of the team."

"What? Kens? That's ridiculous." Nell said.

"I realize that now and you guys gave me the most thoughtful gifts but I was pretty down." Deeks wrapped his arm around her waist.

"You never said anything." Sam said sadly.

"This girl likes to keep all her emotions bottled up." Deeks bumped Kensi's shoulder.

"What I was simply saying was that I'm happy to be here with everyone and Callen, who had to leave."

"Well, we're happy you're back to yourself and we're also happy to have two new members here for this year's Christmas party." Sam said to Mosley and Hidoko.

"Thank you Sam."

Kensi looked around at the decorations hung high and low in the mission. "There are so many memories here."

"Oh I know, I've been here eight years and I can't believe it's already been so long. My whole life has changed here." He looked at Kensi. It was true his whole world was flipped the moment he met Kensi. There was something about her that changed his perspective on life. From agreeing to be her partner, learning to trust each other, falling in love with her or getting engaged, everything had made him a better man and a better person.

"I remember when we first started the Christmas palm tree tradition, it's been there every year since."

"Our Californian Christmas tree."

"The year you had to find that pony or something for Kam." Deeks brought up.

"It was crucial that I found it."

"And then Eric did." Nell said and smiled at him, knowing now that it had actually been his collector's item but he'd given it to Sam.

"You really saved Christmas that year Eric. It could have been a disaster."

"I'm glad." Eric smiled.

"One year we were all stuck on that ship and couldn't be home for Christmas."

"I know but it was still a great Christmas." Deeks said.

"I agree, we made the most out of it and it was fun." She remembered that she had had the greatest time with Deeks and Callen. "Sam got home on time."

"Yes, thankfully. Wouldn't have wanted to miss Christmas with my family."

"Last year when Michelle made dinner…" Kensi was hesitant to bring it up but it was a good memory and it made Sam smile. "That's a really nice evening."

"That was a really good Christmas. I had my entire family there." He continued. "And your Moms." He added and everyone laughed. Their Moms had seemed to be best buds plotting out their children's future at the Hanna house Christmas dinner.

"Oh my god, don't even say another word. It was so awkward."

"There's nothing awkward about caring mothers."

"Speak for yourself."

"They were teaming up." Kensi and Deeks both tried to defend.

"They were not, they were just getting to know each other."

"Pff, are you kidding me? They have our entire future planned."

"It's sweet." Nell tried.

"That's true." Sam agreed with Nell. "Somebody's got to get the ball rolling on your future preparations."

"Hey, we know what we want for our future… or we've at least talked about it." Deeks said and Kensi chuckled. They talk a lot but never come to a real conclusion.

Mosley and Hidoko listened to all the stories they were telling, hearing what the team had been through, the traditions that were necessary every year and how they spent time outside of work like a family.

"When we went ice-skating…"

"That year was amazing!" Deeks practically shouted and Kensi smiled up at him. It was the Christmas they went all in and became a couple. They weren't sure when the rest of the team caught onto their relationship but they were pretty confident that it wasn't near Christmas.

"We weren't there." Eric said.

"No, I think you guys went to visit Nell's family."

"Do you remember that one year Hetty regifted all her gifts?"

"Oh yes!" She couldn't contain her laugh. "I couldn't believe it."

"I got some nice things out of that since you guys weren't grateful." Deeks said.

"We had given her those nice things with great thought and she just gave them away again." The group was hysterical thinking about it. Of course the alcohol helped. Their slightly drunken state made everything more funny.

"So funny." As their laughs died down.

"Oh Hetty, where are you?" They sobered up. They all wondered when or if they would ever see her again. The silence turned awkward as they looked at each other.

"I say we call it a night." Mosley said putting her drink down. "It's getting pretty late and you all need to find a way home safely."

"Yeah."

"Goodnight guys."

"Night."

"I'm good to drive, I only had one eggnog but I don't know about this one." Deeks called behind him to the team as he led Kensi to the exit.

"Hey, they just kept offering, I couldn't say no."

"Excuses, excuses."

"What?! It's true."

"Alright, get in the car. I'll help you."

"I'm not that drunk. I can do it."

She went to open the car door but it wouldn't work so she just laughed. "Apparently not."

"That's because I haven't unlocked it yet."

"Got that."

"Come on, we gotta get home to bed so Santa can come."

* * *

This year they had gone all out with the decorations. Last year Kensi hadn't felt like doing much, she was feeling a little down and left out of the team but this year she was completely involved. They had picked out a nice tree and put it in the corner with lots of decorations on it. Deeks had hung many different Christmas lights on their house and Kensi had made Christmas cookies again. He has noticed lately how often he tends to compare every event this year with the same time last year. Just seeing the difference, he hoped 2018 would give them the full fresh start they needed.

He was in the kitchen making their Christmas-morning breakfast. It would be just the two of them for the morning but their mothers would be joining later in the afternoon to team up and make Christmas dinner.

"I call these Christmas frittatas." He had made sure to have the red and green peppers at the top for the holiday colors to show.

She came over to sit at the table and smelled the frittatas. "I'll never get sick of these. They're amazing."

"Thank you my love."

They started eating and Kensi couldn't keep in the sounds of delight. "Mmm." He enjoyed watching her eat his frittatas because the reaction was always the same. "What?" She looked at him.

"Nothing." He shook his head.

She ignored his weird behavior. "Are you excited to open your present?"

"Very much."

"Good."

She continued to eat but he had stopped to think. "I've been wondering about something for a while now."

She put down her fork, hearing the seriousness in his voice. "What?"

"Why'd you take the lamb?"

She rolled her eyes. "Really? I already told you. It was dirty and I was going to clean it and bring it back."

"Do you really think I believe that?"

"Do you?" She asked distractedly. She slowly met his eyes again and saw the smirk. "It was adorable."

"Alright, if you say so." He was amused.

"It was." She said softly.

"That's my girly girl."

She stuck her tongue out at him. "I am a girl."

"Don't I know it." He agreed.

They finished their breakfast and moved to sit on the floor in front of the Christmas tree.

She reached under the tree for his gift. "Here is your present." She handed him a box.

"Oh, it's heavy." He lifted it up and down getting a feel for the box. "What is it?"

"Open it and find out."

He tore the paper off quickly. "A Playstation." He looked shocked. "You said we had to keep it simple, one not very expensive gift."

"Yeah well, I already had it before you started mentioning it this week." She said. "And it's pretty pricey so that's why I wanted us to give each other one thing."

He looked at the box. "There's a game so technically it's two presents."

"No, the game is included, therefore one present." She had to be correct. "I knew you wanted it. It's not like you've been ogling this set every store we go." She said sarcastically.

"Kens, this is great. Thank you so much." He leaned in and kissed her.

"You're welcome."

He looked back to the small gift under the tree that was for her. "Baby, this gift is so much more expensive than what I got you. Now I feel bad."

"I don't care what it is Deeks. I'll love it cause it's from you."

"Remember that." He laughed as he handed her the envelope.

She opened it quickly and stared at its contents. Inside were two train tickets and a hotel reservation for San Luis Obispo. Just like he had been hinting at the playstation, Kensi had kept mentioning a trip up to there.

"It's just a small weekend getaway."

"This is amazing Deeks." She looked at the tickets. "I've wanted to do this all year."

"It's kind of unfair cause it's for both of us but…"

"It's perfect." She whispered. "Thank you." She hugged him tightly and didn't want to let go but he pushed her back a little so he could kiss her. As the kiss deepened, they slowly shifted so that she was laying on her back and Deeks was hovering above her. "Don't you want to set up your playstation?" She said between kisses.

"I can wait a little bit." He kissed her fiercely again. The playstation could wait till later.

She moved her head. "Are you sure?"

"Mhm." He just continued to kiss her but she stopped him again. "Kens, I love your gift but I love you more. Just let me love you right now."

"Wait!" She smiled widely and reached for something that was laying on the floor next to them and put it on him. "Sexy Santa."

"You like that." He was wearing a Santa hat now.

"Mhm."

"I've been undercover as Santa a couple times now."

"I know. You're so handsome."

"It's true, I'm irresistible,"

She giggled. "I love you so much."

"I love you more."

"I don't think that's possible." She smiled.

"Then I love you equally as much as you love me."

Her face turned serious. "Yeah, so much." He leaned down and kissed her again passionately. They spent the next few hours showing just how much they loved each other.

* * *

Kensi and Deeks had invited everyone over for Christmas dinner or to come afterwards since some of them had plans. The Moms always made too much food so it would be self-serve for everyone who wanted. Sam had agreed to come after his dinner with the kids and Callen after dinner with Finn. Eric and Nell had come a little earlier because they didn't have anywhere else to be this year and they were currently sitting in the living room.

The doorbell rang and Deeks went to open it. "Sam-dawg! Merry Christmas!" Deeks said enthusiastically letting him in. "Hey guys." He added to Kam and Aiden.

"Deeks." Aiden and Deeks gave each other a bro-hug.

"Kensi!" Kam rushed through the door to give Kensi a big hug. "Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas, Kam. How are you? How's school?"

"It's great. I've made so many friends."

"I'm glad."

"And Daddy decorated the boat but we're staying at a hotel this year and the rooms are really nice." She was speaking so fast.

"That's fun."

"Come in, have a seat." Deeks pointed to the couch.

"Are Mosley and Hidoko coming?" Sam wondered.

"We invited them but they said they couldn't come."

"Hm." That was all Sam said. He moved to sit down and greeted everybody else.

"There's food on the table but I'm sure you're stuffed."

"We are."

"Got a new playstation from Kensi, so we can play a game." Deeks said. He'd gotten it all set up this afternoon. Eric was already in full game mode and Nell was talking to Julia.

"I'll join in the next round." Aiden said as he moved closer to the second controller.

Not a minute later the doorbell rang again. Deeks jumped up and opened the door for Callen. "Hey! Merry Christmas!"

"Merry Christmas Deeks."

"Hey, G." Sam stood up to greet his partner. "How was dinner with Finn?"

"It was great."

"Yeah?"

"I got to learn a bit more about him."

"Lot of similarities?"

"Yes there are." He didn't look like he was going to say anything more so Sam let it go.

"Can I get you guys something to drink?" Kensi asked.

"Sure." They requested their drinks and took a seat.

"So you having a good staycation at the hotel?" Eric asked Aiden.

"Oh yeah for sure, the room's nice, the dinner's good and they have a pool."

"That's great."

"Much better than being crammed on a boat with my sister."

Eric laughed. "Yeah, the boat's pretty small for three people."

"Tell me about it. She has too many things."

"Mind if I join?"

"Course not." Aiden reached for the third controller and handed it to Deeks.

"So how's school going? Where are you going again?"

"United States Naval Academy in Annapolis."

"That's in Maryland right?"

"Yeah it is."

"How's that?"

"It's going really well. I'm very happy."

"I'm so glad to hear that."

"Would you boys like something to drink?" Roberta came over to ask them.

"No thank you. Nell's already getting it for me."

"Yeah, Kensi's getting mine."

"Martin?"

"I can get it Momma."

"No, no you're in the middle of a game. I'll go get you your drink."

"Thank you."

"How are you doing Nell?" Kensi asked as walked into the kitchen and saw Nell standing there facing the kitchen counter.

"I'm okay." She said softly not looking up or turning around.

Kensi could tell that something wasn't okay. "What's wrong?" She approached her and tried to look her in the face.

She shrugged her shoulders. "Just sad that I didn't get to visit my family this year. I didn't go last year so…"

"I understand." She didn't have to explain, Kensi knew exactly how important family was to Nell and video-chatting just couldn't make up for missing out on spending time together.

"It sounds so selfish when not everyone's family is complete anymore." She was referring to Michelle no longer being with them.

"Nell, that's not selfish…" She got cut off.

"But I get to spend it with this part of my family and Eric… Eric." Kensi recognized that voice. It was a voice filled with care, support and love. "I don't know what I'd do without him." Kensi smiled. She felt the exact same way about Deeks.

"What are you girls doing hiding in the kitchen?" Roberta's voice cut in. Kensi turned around quickly.

"Just talking."

Roberta looked at the person facing the counter. "Are you okay Nell?" She made her way over and touched her back softly. Her Motherly instincts were kicking in for her son's friends.

"Just really miss my family."

"Oh Kensi told me your family lives back East." Nell nodded. "You don't get to see them very often."

She shook her head. "No."

"That can be so hard."

"It is but I'm grateful I have this family."

"Yes you do, you have the team, your friends…" Nell sniffled. "And you have Eric, don't you?" Roberta asked implying that he was more than just an ordinary friend. Nell smiled as she nodded. "You keep that boy, he's a good one."

She perked up a little. "I know."

"You guys both lucked out in the guy department." Roberta said as she pulled Kensi closer to her and wrapping one arm around her without letting go of Nell's hand with the other.

"We sure did." Kensi couldn't keep the smile off her face.

"Hey, I was wondering what was taking so long." Eric stood there looking at all of them.

"Your girl just got side tracked." Eric blushed slightly at the term Roberta used but he couldn't really object and Nell chuckled as she wiped the last tear away. She turned to get their drinks and then handed one to him.

"Here you go."

"Everything okay?" He could sense that he stepped into an emotional conversation.

"Yeah, I'll tell you later." She reassured him and they walked back to the rest of the group.

Roberta still with her arm around Kensi spoke. "We better get the rest of the guys their drinks."

"Definitely."

"Is this beef?" Aiden asked looking at the food in the pan.

"Yeah, help yourself. There's plates at the end." Deeks pointed to all the utensils at the end of the dining room table.

"You just had a three-course meal and you're still hungry." Sam said incredulously.

"What can I say Dad?"

"You're like Kensi." Deeks laughed.

"Someone say my name." Kensi handed Deeks his drink and then brought the other to Callen.

"The food looks delicious."

"You gotta thank the Moms for that." Deeks said smiling to his Momma.

They all sat down again in the living room, Aiden with his plate filled with food. "Ah this reminds me of Mom's pot-roast, I loved it so much."

Kamran looked at her brother as he enjoyed the food. "How can you be so cheery about it?"

"Kam." Sam warned. The room went silent and looked at them. It had been hard on all of them but she has definitely shown the most struggle on the outside.

"We all know how tough this must be on you." Julia said sympathetically.

"It's been a really hard year and now the holidays are especially difficult. First Christmas without her." He looked over to Kam, who had a very sad look. "Oh come here." He could see the tears starting but once she was in his arms she was fully sobbing. "I know…" He tried to calm her down.

She had her face buried in her Dad's shoulder embarrassed that she was crying in front of everybody. "Why is everyone quiet?" She barely choked out.

"It's okay to cry Kam." Kensi said as she had been sitting next to Sam on the couch. She knew that she was contradicting herself exactly with how she dealt with things but she felt the need to comfort Kam.

"Everybody's looking now." Kam was correct the whole room was watching.

"That's just because we all care about you." She moved a strand of hair out of Kam's face. "You have nothing to be embarrassed about."

"She's right Kam." Her Dad said reassuringly.

The rest of the people took the hint and started up their small conversations again, letting Kensi and Sam talk to her privately. "It's just not the same without her."

"I totally understand." Kensi said sympathetically.

Kam lifted her head up slightly on her Dad's shoulder just so her eyes could look at Kensi. "Your Dad?"

Kensi nodded. "Yeah… it's really hard losing someone you care about."

Kam agreed. It was the worst. When she finally slowed her tears, she lifted her head up a little more.

"Why don't we go frost some cookies for everyone?"

It took her a moment to respond. "Okay." She removed herself from her Dad's arms and followed Kensi to the kitchen.

Sam watched them walk away and was amazed. "She's come such a long way since I met her."

"Kensi, you mean?" Julia asked.

"Yes, I remember a few years ago she was freaked out to babysit my kids." He let out a hearty laugh. "She only agreed to do it if Deeks could help her. The kids had the greatest time with them and now look at her, comforting Kam like a pro."

"I agree. She's matured even in just these few years we've reconnected.

"They're going to be great parents, both in their own way."

"That's for sure." She looked behind her to see if she could watch them but they were further in the kitchen than was visible from the living room. "I'm going to go check on them."

"Sorry to bring down the happy Christmas mood." She wiped her nose with her hand. "I was fine at school but then coming home again and seeing some of her things on the boat or walking somewhere we used to go. It's all memories and they make me sad."

Kensi watched the teen struggle with her emotions, knowing exactly how she felt. "That never ends Kam, but I promise it gets better. You'll think of them as happy memories. Just like Aiden. It just takes everyone a different amount of time and that's okay. Some days are going to be harder than others and that's okay too because you're allowed to be sad sometimes but you also need to be happy." It may have been something Kensi struggled with a lot. After her Dad died she shut everybody out and ran away not giving her much to be happy about. "It's important to talk about it with the people you love. And not to judge each other for being more… or less emotional about something." She'd seen Kam's scolding behavior towards Aiden when he seemed to enjoy remembering his mother's pot-roast. "There is no mandatory timeline for these types of things, it'll happen when it happens."

Kam nodded as a few new tears dropped down her cheeks.

Julia watched Kensi and Kam who were so deep in conversation that they weren't aware of anything happening around them. She saw her daughter reassuring the teenager by getting her tissues to wipe her tears and filling a cup with water.

"Better?" Kensi asked.

"Yes." She stood there for a moment and then spoke again. "Thank you Kensi." Wrapping her arms around her hugging her with a completely different intensity than the hug from when she came in.

Kensi was surprised at first but then hugged her back. She'd honestly just been trying to make Kam feel better but was overwhelmed by the pride and confidence she suddenly felt within her. She was handling a situation she didn't find herself in very often. But before she could reminisce in her own thoughts for too long, she remembered what they came into the kitchen for. "Let's wash our hands and decorate some cookies."

Releasing from each other's embrace, they went to the sink and washed their hands thoroughly. Kensi handed her a towel to dry her hands and then walked over to the counter. "Which color should I use?"

"Whichever one you want. You can use them all." Kensi started taking the lids off the red, green and white frosting. "I have sprinkles too."

They were busy decorating and rearranging them on a plate. "My Mom also made Christmas cookies each year but always the shape of Christmas trees." Kam smiled softly.

"Oh I remember they were amazing. I had so many of them last year."

Kam laughed. "Me too… and always with milk."

"Do you want some now?"

"Yes, please."

"Here, you go take this and put it on the coffee table and I'll get you your milk." She handed her the plate of cookies.

"Okay."

Kam walked away and that was when she saw her mother approaching. "You're going to be an amazing mother." She said right off the bat.

"Mom…"

"I'm just saying, if or when you and Marty decide to have children, you have nothing to worry about because you're going to be great Kensi."

"Thanks Mom. And I hope that's true cause I'm kind of freaking out about that thought. I don't feel prepared at all and I don't know that I ever will be."

"Kens, nobody's ever prepared for parenthood. Even after you have children, you'll still doubt yourself at least once a day, asking if what you're doing is best for your baby. You just go with the flow and take everything as it comes." Kensi looked absolutely horrified. "Don't let me talk you out of it, this is supposed to make you feel better about parenting." She touched Kensi's arm. "Sweetheart, having you was the most amazing thing in my life. Watching you learn and grow was incredible. It also made me see a whole new side to your father and I respected him even more after that, if that's even possible. I am so proud of the woman you've become and knowing that I had even a very small part in that makes me happy. I love you so much."

"I love you too Mom and thank you." She whispered as she hugged her. She couldn't believe she was having a same kind of conversation she'd just had with Kam. A pep-talk of sorts, reassuring her that everything would be okay. She couldn't help but think that she might possibly have this conversation with her daughter someday. It was something she'd been debating in her head and even mentally preparing herself for but she wasn't ready to commit to one path of life just yet, she was keeping her options open. "There's a lot to consider."

They pulled apart only enough to look each other in the eyes. "That's true but you don't have to do that tonight." She insisted. "Now let's get back to the group."

"Okay, I'll be there in a sec, I have to get Kam a glass of milk."

When she walked back into the living room, she gave the glass to Kam and had to wait for Deeks, who was putting back a picture frame, to move so she could get back to her seat.

"Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!" Kam started.

"What?"

It got the attention of everybody else and the rest also joined in. "Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!"

Kensi looked around at them and could see that Deeks looked just as confused as she felt. Kam pointed up at the ceiling and then they saw what it was, a mistletoe.

She looked around the room again to see where it had come from and Nell looked suspicious, not making eye contact with her. They'd never shown too much affection in front of the whole team, at least not on purpose. There was that one time in the car when they hadn't noticed Sam and Callen behind them. They just liked to save their affection for back home but then again, they were home.

They looked at each other awkwardly but then got devilish smiles on their faces. They leaned in slowly but then pecked each other on the lips very quickly and stepped apart.

"No!"

"Ah come on!"

"That wasn't a real kiss." The group shouted their disapproval of their short peck on the lips.

"That was totally a real kiss." Kensi argued.

"No it was not." Sam was adamant. "Do it right this time."

They looked at each other again and smiled softly. Deeks moved in closer to her and wrapped his arms around her waist. "Are we really going to do this?"

"I think so." She said nervously.

He tugged her closer and leaned in for the kiss. She moved her hands to his cheeks to deepen the kiss but didn't want it to go too far. It was magical and felt much longer than it probably was. Cheers and whistles were heard throughout the entire room. When they pulled apart, Kensi was completely embarrassed and hid her face in Deeks' chest.

"I can't believe we just did that in front of everybody." Her voice was muffled in his shirt.

"But we sure did, Princess."

"Let's make a toast." Sam held up his glass and everyone followed his lead. "To family."

"To friends." Callen said.

"To partners." Deeks added looking at Kensi.

"To love." Nell said as she stood awfully close to Eric.

"To a better year in 2018 and to new beginnings." Sam said softly.

"To new beginnings." They repeated.

They may not all have had the same upbringing or be connected by blood but they were their own kind of, slightly dysfunctional, family and that is what mattered.

* * *

Boy, did Kensi spend a lot of time in the kitchen talking to the other women at the party hahaha don't know why that happened anyways, thanks for reading!


	12. Chapter 12 (9x12)

Thank you for the reviews, favorites and follows, also thank you to all the guest reviewers each week, I can't write to you personally but I appreciate the reviews.

This chapter is going to feel a lot shorter than the last one because it is much shorter hahaha! I don't know why I keep going back to the same storyline but it seems to be the season's theme for Deeks and Kensi.

The next chapter has been started and then I'll be caught up again. Good thing I have 6 or so weeks to catch up! But not really, it's way too long between episodes. The cliffhanger was just too much and now we have to wait so long for part 2. Also I finally got a picture for my account yay!

This picks up after the twelfth episode of season 9, _Under Pressure_ (9x12).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

Deeks, Kensi and Callen we're sitting at a booth when Sam finally showed up.

"What way did you go? You're a half hour later than us."

"Sorry, I was talking to Kam."

"She okay?" Kensi asked worriedly.

"Yeah, I'm the one that called her. Just checking in."

"Did she start the new semester okay?"

"Oh yeah, she's doing great."

"That's good to hear."

"I just wanted to make sure that everything was going well and let her know that she can always talk to me."

"Aw, that's cute." Deeks smiled.

"The girl today was being bullied and the guy took advantage of her. I just don't want Kam to ever go through that, it's not worth it. We'd change schools in a second if anything ever happened." Sam told Deeks since he wasn't there today.

"I don't understand why kids have to be mean to each other. Why can't everyone just mind their own business or be kind?"

"Kids are cruel."

"Were you guys ever bullied?" Callen asked.

"No, not really. I've always been pretty big so I guess people were intimidated." Sam buffed his chest.

"Me too." Callen said.

"Yeah, I don't think anyone ever bullied me. If they did, it either didn't make a big impression on me or I just took it as a compliment." Deeks smirked.

"What about you Kens?" Sam asked her since she hadn't responded.

She was toying with the straw in her water. "Uhm, yeah no I was, sort of."

"What? You never told me that."

"Well… after my Dad died… I switched schools and I was super tall and skinny, just extremely awkward and I'd missed a lot of school, started somewhere in the middle so I was an outcast and an easy target. They called me names like bag of bones, chicken legs and olive oil." Deeks reached for her hand under the table.

"I'm sorry you had to go through that." Sam sympathized.

"It's alright. I was talking to Hidoko today and she was right, it got better and college was definitely more enjoyable."

"I agree. College was much better." That topic died down and the waitress brought more beer.

"So 39, one year away from the big 40. You're getting old." Sam slapped him on the back, laughing.

"What do you guys have planned? Besides work." Callen was interested.

"Well, she's not telling me anything." Deeks said dramatically.

"It's a surprise but it'll be fun."

"You can't give me like just little hint?"

"Nope, not a chance."

Sam and Callen laughed at the incredulous looks the two younger team members were giving each other. "Let's make a toast." Sam held up his glass. "Deeks, our good friend and co-worker. Thank you for many years of hard work and dedication this job. You're a great detective and you'd make a great agent… even though you come up with weird little games, joke around a lot and talk too much but Kensi doesn't seem to mind anymore." Kensi leaned into Deeks' side and put her head on his shoulder.

"Love is blind." Callen interjected and they all laughed.

Sam continued. "We may not have always seen eye to eye but we've come to respect each other and I can't imagine the team without you."

"Thank you Sam."

"Cheers!"

* * *

She stopped right in front of him as he closed the door to the house. "I didn't see you all day, I missed you."

"I missed you too." He pecked her lips.

She wrapped her arms around him just wanting to be close. "I'm so happy to be home."

"Long day."

"Mhm." She had her eyes closed, taking in his familiar scent and the warmth of his body.

"Why didn't you tell me you were teased in high school?"

She pulled back but they kept their hands linked. "I don't know. It wasn't that bad, I was just insecure about myself."

"Wow…"

"Hard to believe I haven't always been a badass, isn't it?"

"Now, I don't believe that for one second. My kickass-Kensalina has and always will be a badass."

"I thought I was but… I'm much stronger now."

"Oh I know. You're incredibly strong and you get stronger every day."

She smiled at the compliment. "Thank you." She decided to share more about her past. "I was on the street for about a year and then I guess I sort of isolated myself from other classmates. I was just focused on school after that. I was taking classes on the side, extra courses outside of school, I had tutoring. They helped me get caught up and I graduated on time."

"That's great. Not to have to stay back and delay your future."

"Really got my life back on track."

"I can't even imagine what you had to go through living on the street. You were fifteen."

She looked at their intertwined hands. "Yeah, I wouldn't want my child to ever go through that."

"I want them to have a better childhood than we had."

She nodded but then stopped. "Wait, them? As in multiple?"

"Of course." He took in her horrified face. "Well, I mean, we don't…" She then smiled mischievously. "Mmm, you're mocking me." He stated.

"I say we start with one and see from there. You never know when I might change my mind."

"Just don't want them to be lonely."

"I think we turned out okay."

"That's true. We are pretty awesome."

"Agreed." She let go of one of his hands. "Now, I wanna hear about your day." She poked him in the chest. He looked at his arm. "I'll get you an ice-pack."

She let go of him completely to walk to the kitchen and he went to the couch already starting to tell her. "It was kinda like that killhouse thing we did a few years ago except I didn't really know any of the other people so there wasn't the same amount of trust." He moved over some of the cushions when she came back. "Got these cause some new guy didn't watch my six." He lifted his shirt up to show his shoulder again. "I turn around, the guy's gone and I get shot in the arm."

"Definitely not pros like we are." She threw some hair behind her, doing a hairflip showing her confidence in the team.

"Definitely not." He agreed. "It would be hard joining another team after working with the same people for eight years."

"It would be… but you'd adapt like any other time you've switched jobs."

"That's true, but I've never felt any personal connections to the other jobs."

"Then why not become an agent so you're stuck with us?" She smiled.

"I don't know, as good as it sounds, I'm kind of happy the way it is. It leaves options open for when we want to start a family."

"But you could still get sent back for however long just like today."

"Yeah." He had been considering those things in his head.

"I don't want you off doing dangerous things without me watching your back."

"Trust me I feel the same way but I just don't know how long we're going to continue doing this job."

"I know."

She didn't say anything and was deep in thought when he looked over. "What're you thinking about?"

She shrugged. "I never have the right answer to that."

"There is no right or wrong answer to your ideas or opinions." She didn't react. "Kens?"

"I just don't know and I keep saying that cause don't have an answer and I feel like I'm letting you down."

"You're not letting me dow…"

"I don't like change. I've been with NCIS since 2003. I think I was 21, it's all I know."

"Kens, you said so yourself, you'd adapt. It would be a change, yes, but it's for a great reason. You'll have a different purpose, a different priority in life, someone else to protect."

"That's a terrifying thought. They're dependent on you and I can't even keep a plant alive."

"First of all babies and children will notify you when they need something. Their cries cannot be missed. You don't have to worry that you'll forget about them. Second, everything new you try, you succeed at. If not at first, then you overcome it later on. You tackle everything with your fullest potential and you make it work."

She still didn't look him fully in the eye. "Some days I'm so confident about it but then I think about what it really entails…"

"You're not alone Kens, I have no idea what to do with kids. I didn't have a good example growing up, I don't know what good dads are like but I'm willing to try and I know that I'll be much better than him and they're going to turn out to be even better humans than us. We're partners, in every sense of the word."

"You're going to be such a great Dad, Deeks."

"Well I know you're going to be an amazing Mom." She looked away blushing. "Mmm our mutant ninja assassins." She smiled embarrassed. "You teaching them about nature and how to fix cars cause I'm definitely not going to do that."

"Mhm." She leaned in closer.

"Oh, leaning in." He observed as he did the same. Their lips met and he put his hand on her hip. Their kisses were getting heated so he went to pull up her shirt.

"Uh, uh, uh not tonight." She pushed him back and stood up.

"Oh come on! You can't leave me hanging like that."

"You have to be ready early tomorrow morning for Deeks' Birthday Bash." She called behind her as she left the room.

"That's so unfair." He mumbled to himself.

"I heard that." She shouted from the other room.

"Son of a…" He followed her but little did he know that his birthday celebration was going to begin in less than 20 minutes as the clock struck midnight.

* * *

You can fill in the rest with your imagination :) Thanks for reading!


	13. Chapter 13 (9x13)

I reached 50 reviews which is crazy! Thank you all so much! I may have gone overboard with the drama but I just really love writing it. I also don't know why I felt like I didn't have much to write but I guess we really don't know where the next episode is going to pick up.

I'm really nervous about this chapter because it feels kind of out of character but it's how I see it in my head. I'm probably way off because I'm sure Kensi will be a badass in the next episode but I feel like this whole episode was sort of building up to this. I don't think it will fit in with the next episode, I don't know. We'll see in a few weeks cause they're making us wait that long! I hope you like it.

The whole vibe for this feels very different because it's all on a plane and I don't love flying. I flew a couple days ago so I wrote from my perspective, there were lots of empty seats and I could actually lay down :) School started again today and I didn't post nearly as much as I wanted to but I promise there's more to come soon.

This picks up after the thirteenth episode of season 9, _Cac Tu Nhan_ (9x13).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

The ride to the airport was done mostly in silence as they all thought about the mission ahead but of course they found their voices to joke. On this rare occasion it wasn't Deeks who started it.

"You planning on taking a nap Deeks? I thought we were going to plan out our mission on the flight." He heard the smirk in Sam's voice and knew exactly what he was talking about.

"We need to be prepared." Callen added only half joking because they really did need to be prepared. Deeks knew that his neckpillow would get made fun of at some point but he'd be the one laughing when he was the only one even remotely comfortable on the flight.

"I just thought we'd need to rest so we can be ready. I need my beauty sleep." He had no problem being the target of the jokes if it helped everybody relax but when he looked at Kensi he saw that she wasn't listening at all. Instead, she was staring out of the window, oblivious to anything around her. He reached out to hold her hand and that seemed to pull her out. She looked at him and gave a small toothless smile. The rest of the drive was silent again.

They were some of the last people to board the plane since they got there so late.

They carried their hand-luggage on hoping to find a spot in the overhead compartment so they wouldn't have to put it under their feet. When they looked around the plane, it became clear that their luggage wouldn't be a problem because there were lots of empty seats.

The plane had two seats on each side and three seats in the middle. Sam and Callen took the center so they could spread out with the extra seat not filled and Kensi and Deeks on the side in the two seats together. Deeks put the bags above them and then turned to Kensi.

"Do you want the aisle or window Kens?"

"Aisle." She said shortly.

He got in first and then she sat down. They got situated in their seats and fastened their seatbelts, Deeks with his neckpillow in place, just waiting for the plane to take off.

The crew walked up and down the aisles to make sure everything was good and then they started to move. Kensi had her head leaning against the chair and her eyes closed when Deeks looked over.

"You okay?" He asked slightly worried and she nodded a little. "You sure?" She didn't respond and he saw that she was concentrating on her breathing.

They've had to fly a couple times since the helicopter crash last year but not for this long. He knew she was stressed to fly now and if he was honest with himself, he was too. He could still go back to the feelings he had felt when the helicopter was going down and she must feel worse remembering how she woke up underneath it. He actually wasn't sure how much she remembered from that day but he remembered it vividly. He did know that it had caused her a long recovery and that those thoughts were lingering in her mind. All of that on top of the mission to find Hetty was a lot to process.

He reached for her hand again and looked out the window to see that they had reached the runway. The plane picked up speed, shaking a bit and the moment it lifted off the ground, Kensi squeezed his hand tightly. It took him by surprise when he felt her strong grip.

"Hey, you're okay." He moved a piece of hair out of her face and saw that her eyes remained closed. "Tell me what's going on."

"I think I'm just overwhelmed." He could hear that she was on the verge of tears.

"I know you are, I could tell something was up this morning." She had been emotional finding that photo of Hetty and Granger, irritated when she'd been scolded by Mosely and worried when she pulled the 'woman's voice-of-reason card'. Deeks didn't even know about the conversation she'd had with Nell where she expressed her feelings about going to find her.

"It's all too much." She choked out. Now that the adrenaline of the day was gone and all she could do was wait and sink into her dark thoughts, she started feeling helpless.

"I get it." He was sympathizing with her.

She finally opened her eyes to look at him. "I'm nervous, anxious…" Her voice died down.

"Scared?" He asked gently.

She didn't like that word. Kensi Blye didn't get scared but the truth is she was. She was terrified because she had no idea what they would find once they stepped off this plane. Would Hetty be there? Would she be alive? Her confidence was crumbling as the reality set in. They were flying into the unknown.

"Scared." She admitted softly.

"Me too." He wiped away the single tear that fell down her cheek. "Really scared. But I have to keep reminding myself that this is Hetty and she always has a plan we don't even know about."

She nodded willing herself to believe him but she felt like this time was different. More tears came as she berated herself for even thinking that way.

"You don't think we're going to find her alive?"

"I don't know." She could barely get out. She didn't want to say it out loud. "I just want her to be okay and for everything to go back to the way it was before. Before the crash, the mole, Granger disappearing and Hetty…" She couldn't continue because she was so distraught.

"So do I but we can't change the past, we can only prepare for the future."

"Oh my god." She grabbed onto the armrest and had her eyes shut tightly as there was turbulence.

"You're okay. It's just the clouds." Her breathing got heavier as the plane continued to shake. "Kens, just breathe." She leaned forward putting her head on her hands not calming down one bit. "Deep breaths, Kens." He was rubbing circles on her back now. "Deep breaths." He kept repeating softly for several minutes.

The plane finally straightened out and the turbulence got less but that did nothing to calm her nerves. A stewardess was walking up the aisle when she stopped right in front of them. "Is she okay?"

"Uh…" He didn't really know what to say.

"Can I get you something to drink?" She asked Kensi but spoke to Deeks.

"Maybe just some water, thank you." Deeks replied.

"No problem." She disappeared into the kitchen.

"Kens are you feeling sick or just panicking?"

"Not sick." She muttered softly still hunched over and not wanting to say that she was panicking.

He continued to rub circles on her back. "You don't have to panic Kens, we're all going to be okay. Hetty is incredibly strong and she's just waiting for us to bring her home. She trusts us to have her back and I have all confidence that we will."

Sam and Callen watched as the younger team member tried to console his partner. She looked like she was having a panic attack and having trouble catching her breath. She seemed so strong when they left the mission but had slowly shut everybody out and turned to herself on the ride over. Deeks reached up twisting open the cap for air and then went back to rubbing small circles her back.

"Is there anything we can do to help?" Sam asked.

"Uhm…" He needed to think because he was kind of freaking out himself as he couldn't get her to calm down. "Yes, you could get out the medication on the side of her bag." Sam stood up right away. "It's the one with the red ribbon on the side."

He got down her bag and unzipped several pockets to look for the medicine. When he finally found it, he realized there were some different kinds of prescriptions. "Which one? Anti-anxiety or sleep medication?" Sam didn't realize that she still had all this medicine prescribed which he assumed was because of the accident a year ago.

The stewardess came back with a glass of water and handed it to Deeks. "Is there anything else I can do?"

"No, I think we're okay." He told her and then turned back to Kensi. "Kens? Baby?" He was trying to get her attention. "Do you want to take the anxiety or sleeping medicine?"

"I don't know."

He was sure their entire section was trying to see what was going on but he couldn't care about that in this moment all he wanted was for his fiancée to be okay.

"I think you should take the sleeping medicine and just get some rest, okay?" She nodded. "Okay, I'm going to need you to sit up." Deeks helped her put her back against the seat and handed her the cup of water. As he was getting the medicine out of the bottle he could see her hands shaking uncontrollably. Sam who was still standing, waiting to assist, took the cup out of her hands until she was ready. Deeks handed her the sleeping pills and then took the cup from Sam and held it up for her to drink. She held the cup as well but he didn't let go in order to keep it steady.

"What else can we get you guys?"

"Uh, I don't think either of us got blankets." Deeks looked around on the ground.

"I'll go get that." Callen said as he rushed to find a stewardess.

"We're going to get you comfortable, don't you worry." Deeks reassured his fiancée. "Let's lay you back. There's nobody behind you." He pressed the button and her seat lowered.

"Deeks…"

"Yeah, what can I get you Kens?" She let out a deep breath. "You're okay." He kissed the side of her head. "Do you want to use my neckpillow?" He didn't wait for her answer and lifted her head to slide the pillow around her neck. "There you go." They had all mocked him for it but it was proving to be useful.

"I need to be mission ready." She said softly. Deeks looked over to Sam who had also heard her speak.

"You will be when the time comes. You just need to get some rest and try to sleep. By the time we land we'll all be refreshed and prepared."

She'd seemed to have calmed down a little now, her eyes only focusing on Deeks. She was embarrassed about her behavior in front of her other team mates. She was supposed to be strong and they'd now seen her in a moment of weakness.

"I can see the wheels turning in your head. Stop thinking Kens. You just need to close your eyes and rest." Deeks said smiling and she did as he said.

Callen came back with blankets. "Here." He stopped next to Sam and they both watched as Deeks tucked Kensi in. Her eyes were already closed and she didn't seem to register Deeks' movement. He knew the medicine likely didn't work that fast showing just how exhausted she was.

"Thank you guys." Deeks said to Callen and Sam.

"We're a family and that's what families do."

They gave each other a silent nod, this was it. When they stepped off the plane, they would only have one goal in mind. They were going to bring Hetty home.

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	14. Chapter 14 (9x14)

Hello again! I feel like I haven't done this in so long, which is true because the hiatus was long! I loved the new episode! It was so good and exciting! Hetty is coming home and I'm so happy about that. I can't wait to see how she and Mosley try to figure out how to work together. Of course this took forever to write so the next episode has already aired!

I'm so excited to be writing these chapters again. It's like getting a new prompt to write about each week and it forces me to get it done. I've been writing some other stories but often get a new idea and then start that, so I have lots of beginnings of stories but not yet a complete story idea to post hahaha!

In the last scene when they're on the helicopter I can't really tell if their camo face paint is still on so I'm just going to go with yes and from what I can tell Mosley just addresses the team by their first names or last whichever they prefer, but I wasn't sure.

This picks up after the fourteenth episode of season 9, _Goodbye, Vietnam_ (9x14).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

Sam and Callen helped Hetty walk out of the cabin she'd been held in. She was weak but very relieved that they had come to her rescue. They would have to wait for the helicopter so Sam got out his small emergency kit to clean some of Hetty's wounds. Keane was also in need of medical attention soon so they hoped they could get out of there quickly.

"We got all the people except for one. He's tied up over there." Sam pointed to a different building.

"Then we've got some unfinished business to attend to." She was referring to Dang.

* * *

When Mosley and Hidoko left the room, Nell finally released the breath she was holding. She looked up to Eric and he smiled. They gravitated towards each other quickly and just held on. His arms wrapped around her shoulders and her face buried in the crook of his neck. The relief she felt was overwhelming her and causing her to get emotional.

"You found her just in time Eric."

He stroked her hair. "We all did." He kissed the side of her head. "You figured out why she gave you the flashlight; Hidoko knew what the words in the book meant; Mosley booked the flight tickets for the team; Callen, Sam, Kensi and Deeks just rescued her…" He released his breath. "And she's coming home."

She nodded her head. "It all worked out perfectly. We couldn't have been a second later." They got to her with no time to spare. Another second later and the outcome could have been very different.

"The universe works in mysterious ways sometimes."

"So does Hetty." She said softly. That thought got them both laughing again. Some way or another Hetty always had a plan but this one seemed very risky. She had to have faith in the team to know that they would find her and they did.

"I'm sorry again for what I said to your sister. It wasn't my place… She was just asking about our relationship and my intentions and…"

"It's okay Eric. You said what I've wanted to my entire life and I've never had the courage to. Nobody knows how close we really are, definitely not her. We hardly talk, I don't call her very often."

"I just hate seeing you upset and I know how much being called Togo irritates you."

"I know it's because you care. Nobody's ever stood up for me like that." She squeezed him a little tighter and then moved back. "Okay, let's go home."

"Take your own car?"

"Yeah, I'll meet you at your apartment."

xxx

"Deeks wake up." She said gently. "We're almost there." That was partially the reason she woke him up but also because she wanted to talk to him during the landing.

He started to stir. "I'm up." He was slightly disoriented still from being in a deep sleep, the result of the time difference to Los Angeles and because he didn't sleep on the plane but he was awake now. "You still okay?" It was still be hard for her to be on a plane especially a helicopter like the one they crashed with last year.

"Yeah." He reached for her hand. "Much better now that we have Hetty here."

They both looked over to Hetty and saw that she was asleep with her head against Callen's shoulder. "They look so cute."

"Deeks…"

"I'm sure we looked just as cute a few minutes ago." She chuckled and then leaned her own head on Deeks' shoulder. He removed his hand from hers to move it over her shoulder so that they were completely wrapped up in each other's arms.

* * *

Nell logged out of and shut down the computers. Then slung her bag over her shoulders and descended the stairs from osp. Deep in thought, she was surprised to hear someone speak.

"Good work today Nell."

She turned around and saw Mosley. "Thank you." Suddenly shy again. Completely opposite from when she took charge earlier. "And thank you again for everything today. It means a lot to me and the team."

"We couldn't have rescued her without you. I'm glad she's okay."

"Me too."

"Goodnight Nell."

"Goodnight Executive Assistant Director Mosley."

* * *

They arrived at the medical center hoping they could get Keane some more medical attention before heading to the United States again. Hetty was also taken to a room to get checked out even though she seemed okay, Callen insisted wanting to make sure everything was good.

Chegwidden, Langston and Bridges sat on the chairs to the side and Sam was pacing down the hallway. Deeks and Kensi were left standing in the lobby so he grabbed onto her hand and pulled her along. "Come."

"Where are we going?"

"You'll see." He grabbed a towel from his bag and lead the way.

"You know this is the women's restroom right?" She asked as he proceeded to push open the door to the public restroom in the lobby.

"There's nobody in here at this hour. Hop up." He pointed to the sink that had a countertop next to it and then checked all the stalls to see that he was correct, nobody else was in there.

She sat next to the sink, her legs dangling off the side, as she waited for him to come back. "Clear?"

"Yep. Time to get the camo paint off of your face." He started to unclip parts of her outer armor and laying it down next to her. He unzipped the coat and then helped her take it off. He was uncovering the many layers she had on until she was down to just her black long sleeve shirt. His hands lingered on her hips and then went to move the shirt up.

"Deeks." Her tone warning him.

"I'm just kidding. Don't worry Fern." Flashing his signature smile. He took the towel and wet it under the sink. Then stood in front of her and gently wiped the towel down her cheek.

She watched as he concentrated on cleaning her face. Looking into his piercing blue eyes, she'd looked at so many times before yet they had a different hue each time, she basked in the pleasant silence. She got lost in his eyes thinking about all that had occurred in the last 24 hours. The whirlwind of events was enough to overwhelm anybody even her. The range of emotions she'd felt in just the last hour or so, was beyond fathomable.

"Are you tearing up?" Deeks' voice pulled her out of her thoughts.

"No." She said defensively.

"Don't worry Kens. I know everything about you, you don't have to hide. I see you."

"I think you just wiped some paint in my eye." She laughed and he joined in while wiping her eyes from the tears with a clean part of the towel. "I'm just so happy everyone's okay."

"Me too. It's a relief. I feel like a whole weight has been lifted off my shoulders." She nodded in agreement. Another stroke over her forehead got some more the paint off her face. "Quite a team we had today."

"Yeah can you believe Rio, or whatever his name is, is here?"

"It's crazy."

"Unbelievable. I'm up to here with him." She held up her hand to show him and he laughed. "It's not funny."

"It kinda is."

He wet the towel again and started to clean his own face with the help through the mirror. "No let me." She took the towel out of his hands and shifted his shoulders so she was facing him. "What did you think of our older team members today?"

"They sure think they know everything."

"You're more like them than you'd probably like to admit. Especially Bridges."

"What? I'm not like him at all."

"Oh please. You're the one who suggested that they're us in the future."

"I'm not like him." He was adamant.

She gave him a look but he didn't cave in. Exasperated she just went ahead and said it. "You both have to pee all the time."

"That was in the past, I don't do that as much anymore."

"You both talk way too much."

"You love hearing my voice."

"The hair."

"What's wrong with my golden locks? I know you love them too." She wasn't even going to respond this time. "Fine. You're right."

"I'm always right, just go with it."

"I should get used to it huh? Especially after we're married, the wife always wins."

"You bet."

"Happy wife, happy life."

She wiped the last of the paint off his face. "And I do love your golden locks." She ruffled her fingers through his hair and then touched her forehead to his. The smiles turned serious and their breaths synchronized. Her hands moved down to the nape of his neck and her legs wrapped around his to pull him closer to the counter. Her soft lips kissed his cheek and he reciprocated. Her kisses continued until her lips were on his. They deepened their kiss as his hands reached for her hips. Before things could get too heated, they heard the door click and pulled apart. When Hetty came into view they released their arms from each other completely and Kensi hopped off of the counter.

"Hi Hetty. How are you doing?"

"Much better now, thank you Mr. Deeks."

Suddenly realizing he was in the women's restroom again, he excused himself. "Uhm I'm gonna go see if the guys need any help. See you out there." He said to Kensi.

"Yeah."

He laid a hand on Hetty's shoulder on the way out and then shut the door. Kensi was left standing against the sink looking at Hetty who had her head facing down.

"Hetty?"

"Mhm." She lifted her head.

"Are you okay?"

"Yes, my dear. I'm doing alright. How are you doing Miss Blye?"

She huffed a laugh. "Really well." Hetty seemed surprised by that response. Kensi wasn't one to share overwhelming emotion of sadness or happiness. "I'm so glad you're safe." She moved a strand of hair out of her face. "I've missed you Hetty." She added softly.

"I have missed you and the rest of the team as well. It's been a long time since I have seen you all."

"Very long time."

"I'm glad you didn't give up on me."

Kensi looked down feeling guilty. She hadn't wanted to come to Vietnam to find her because she honestly thought they wouldn't. "I almost did." She said softly not daring to look into Hetty's eyes.

"Almost… but you didn't and I'm very grateful for that."

Kensi nodded her head and Hetty opened her arms. She hesitated like she usually did and then embraced Hetty with so much love. She was the woman who gave her encouragement and confidence as the only other woman on the team. She'd given her advice about being a strong woman holding her ground with all the guys. Later Nell came along but the females had still been outnumbered for many years.

She wasn't sure if Callen had already told her about the new additions to the team but she wasn't going to bring it up. With Mosley and Hidoko now part of the team, the ratio was even if Hetty wasn't included. She didn't know if she'd come back after her retirement.

"Us women have to stay strong. We can't let our fears control us." Hetty said as if she had read her mind. Not only about being strong but also the fear of flying that had been continuously on her mind. "Now, let's go see what the boys are up to." Hetty patted her on the back and then they pulled apart. Kensi grabbed her gear and silently followed her out of the restroom.

The lobby was now filled with everyone waiting for them. Kensi walked over to Deeks and they all looked at each other. "Alright." Deeks said. "We're going home." The words echoed the ones he'd spoken so many times before. A promise to bring each other home safely. "We're going home."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	15. Chapter 15 (9x15)

Thank you for the reviews, favorites and follows! I really liked that the whole team was working together again. It felt like the old episodes and Hetty is back at the office. The ending of the episode was sad and beautiful. We now know what happened to Granger and it was so nice to see that he went to see his daughter. Miguel you are missed.

This got sort of deep again hahaha. Emotional Kensi and all. I just love to write it and I'm sorry if that's not your favorite. They also spent a lot of time coming home to their house and in the car! You'll see what I mean when you read it :)

Next chapter has been started and will be up soon!

This picks up after the fifteenth episode of season 9, _Liabilities_ (9x15).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

They entered their home after the long day at work. They were tired and dusty from being far underground in the Los Angeles tunnels and all Kensi wanted to do was take a nice bath, watch some tv and curl up next to her fiancé.

She was standing next to the door, they'd just walked in through, getting her laptop and phone out of her shoulder bag before putting it down. Deeks was also still standing by the door but he was busy trying to take off his shoes.

"Aah it hurts." He whined.

She laughed. "You're such a drama queen."

He laughed with her. "I know I usually am but I think I really hurt it."

"You think you pulled a muscle?" She was sympathetic now.

"Maybe it's just sore, I don't know."

"You want an ice-pack or a heat-pack?"

"Yeah, heat sounds good." She went into the kitchen and got a pack she could heat in the microwave.

"I feel like we've been using these so often lately." She looked at him as she waited for the microwave to ding.

"That's cause we have." He lowered himself down onto the couch with a grunt. Whether he had pulled a muscle or not, he knew he had gotten bruises from the knife fight. Everything ached and he was tired.

"Are you good though?"

"Yeah, of course."

"I mean… I only saw the last part of the fight but you're okay right?"

"Kens, I'm great. Don't worry." The microwave dinged and she walked over to the couch.

"I know you don't like knives or knife fights…"

"Baby, really I'm good… and I don't hate all knives. I'm so glad you taught me some moves and techniques with your Dad's knife."

"Me too. I'm so glad you're safe." He agreed.

"Now can we talk about how cool that location was?"

She huffed a laugh. "Yeah, if we didn't have to go down there because of bad guys."

"Well, that's always the case. Thanks." He said as she finally remembered to hand him the heat-pack. "We've seen some pretty cool places over the years."

"Yeah, that's Los Angeles for ya. Just wish I didn't know how dangerous it really is."

"It's a little safer now that we're here to save the day."

"That's true. We do good work." She admitted confidently.

"We do…" His cell phone started to ring from his back pocket so he moved to his side with a grunt again and looked at the screen. "It's Sam."

"Please don't tell me we're getting called in again."

He answered. "Hey Sam. What's up?"

"You guys up for a drink?"

"Uhm… we're actually really tired, maybe another time…"

"It's kind of important. We can meet at the bar near your place." That was definitive statement with no room for argument.

"Okay, we'll meet you there." He hung up.

"Do we have a case?"

"No, but he sounded pretty serious."

"Do you have any idea what it could be?"

"No, he didn't say."

* * *

"Hey guys." They were kind of surprised to see the whole team sitting there already even Hetty. Kensi moved to sit in the booth and Deeks followed her.

"So mysterious." Kensi laughed but Sam and Callen both had serious looks on their faces so she stopped. Eric and Nell didn't seem to know either and she tried to figure out what was about to be said.

"What's going on?" Deeks finally asked expressing her and Eric and Nell's thoughts as well.

"After the case we went back to see Jennifer Kim." Sam paused. Kensi still didn't know why they would have to come to hear this. "I asked her for permission to tell you all this." Again not saying what it was yet. "She has been living in a remote area in witness protection and Granger came to see her." That was weird why did he go to see her and not them? "She's Granger's daughter."

"What?" Kensi said softly more to herself than anybody else. How had none of them known about this before?

"Wow." Deeks said. "So he spent time with his daughter and then where did he go? Where is he now?" He asked like an innocent child. Sam and Callen looked down and then Hetty did as well. He had a feeling like everyone knew what was going on but him but when he looked to Kensi all he saw was shock.

Sam finally lifted his head after what felt like the longest time to Deeks. "He… passed away when he was there."

He saw all the blood drain from her face. That was not what they were expecting to hear this evening and it hit them all out of the blue very hard.

* * *

The ride back home was completely silent. Kensi hadn't said a word since the news except for a mumble goodbye. He honestly hadn't really noticed himself because he was in his own world thinking about it all but when he parked, he realized how far away they were from reality. She'd let him drive home by handing over the keys without saying anything. She never said it but whenever she felt overwhelmed she would silently hand him the keys and let him take the wheel.

He turned off the ignition, got out of the car and started to make his way towards the house. When he noticed that she wasn't following him, he saw her staring blankly ahead of her in the car. Walking back over, he gently opened the car door not to startle her. "Kens?"

"Hm." She looked up at him.

"We're home." She nodded and undid her seatbelt.

He unlocked the door to their house and let her step in first. He knew she was gutted by the news and they needed to get sleep. They had already been tired before hearing about it but he was even more exhausted now. He knew she was emotionally drained.

"Let's go to bed." She followed him silently up the stairs and they got ready for bed. She was just going through the motions until she was laying in his arms. "Everything's going to be okay." She knew it would be true but it was hard to look into the future in moments like these.

* * *

They had decided to meet up at Jennifer Kim's house the next day. She was kind enough to let them come and see the place. He parked the car on the dirt road and saw the house up the hill slightly. He turned to face his fiancée and she was aware that he was staring at her so she turned her head to look at him as well.

"How are you doing?"

"I'm okay Deeks." He wasn't sure it was completely truthful but he trusted her to tell him if she really wasn't. She looked ahead of her again. "It's beautiful up here."

He agreed, it really was beautiful. The nature and stillness of the surroundings. They were in the middle of nowhere with just green around them and Jennifer's house in their view. "Let's go see the tree."

As they were getting out of the car, Eric and Nell pulled up behind them. "Hey." Eric said.

"Hi." Nell had a bouquet of flowers and was wearing her usual outfit. A dress with floral print, Kensi knew that Nell loved so much.

"How are you holding up Lady?"

"I'm okay, how about you?"

"I'm doing better today, but it's hard." She agreed.

They all walked up the hill where the tree was and Jennifer told them more about spending time with her father. When they all saw the view of the valley, it took their breaths away. It was stunning and a beautiful place for Granger to rest.

When Kensi thought about that, that he was going to rest here forever, she got emotional. Deep down she already knew but just like her thoughts about Hetty, sometimes it was better not to know. Then maybe he'd still be out there and she wouldn't feel so sad. But the reality was that he wasn't. He wasn't going to walk into OSP one day, he wasn't going to call them to talk and he wasn't going to see them again. Finding out where someone was, had worked for Hetty, they found her alive but this time the outcome was different.

Deeks pulled her closer. "It's okay." He tried to reassure her but she just sobbed.

Nell, Eric, Jennifer and Hetty decided to leave them alone and Sam and Callen each laid a hand on her back for comfort as they walked away as well.

"Kens." He moved her hair to try and get a look of her face. "Baby." When she finally looked up he could see the utter devastation on her face. She couldn't stop the tears from falling. This was definite, Granger was never going talk to her again. She wasn't showing any signs of stopping so he decided to just talk about him. "You know, I don't think I ever told you this, there was actually a time he pulled me aside and gave me some encouraging words. It was when you were in the hospital and he really helped me. I was discouraged and he knew exactly what to say. I'm very sad that I won't get to speak to him again."

She nodded. "He always knew what to do." Her voice broke. "I didn't get to see him very much when I was in the hospital and then when I was at OSP, he was already almost gone and then he got hurt and…" She was engulfed in his arms again. "I miss him."

"I know you do. I miss him too." He paused for a moment before continuing. "It's so hard losing a sort of father figure. I know we didn't always see eye-to-eye but I learned to respect him and later on he respected me too, at least that's what I tell myself." Kensi chuckled and he pulled back slightly to look at her face. "There's that beautiful smile." A watery smile nonetheless but it was something.

She wiped her tears but they still came pouring down. "Why can't I stop crying?" She laughed slightly embarrassed.

"Cause we're human." He helped her wipe more tears away this time. "And even the hardheaded badass Blye isn't an exception to it." They stared at the view of the valley, knowing that now they could have closure.

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	16. Chapter 16 (9x16)

Thank you so much for the nice reviews! My author's notes have gotten so much longer since my first chapters hahaha! I was reading some of my older posts and saw some typos but it's gone from my story manager so I can't correct it easily anymore oh well!

I tried to give Deeks some more emotion this week because he was kind of scolded by Callen and that can be frustrating but I'm not sure if it's a little too out of character. Also, I had written some things before they talked about it in the next episode and then they did so it fits nicely.

This picks up after the sixteenth episode of season 9, _Warriors of Peace_ (9x16).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

She woke up early in the morning when something moved next to her. That something was the shaggy guy she loved so much. His adorable face and blond, no gray, hair. It wasn't Deeks but Monty. Deeks was still there but Monty had hopped onto the bed and made his way up next to their heads. He seated himself right in between them and laid down. She petted his fur and he turned onto his back rolling over to Deeks' head.

"Shh Monty, don't wake your Dad." She whispered.

Just like the night before, he had come into their bed and she'd woken up then too. She chuckled to herself as she thought about Deeks' panic over the gray hair. She wasn't sure she liked the image Deeks painted of his grandfather but she was only joking when she said the marriage would be off if the earlobes started drooping. She loved this man with all her heart and would never willingly leave him.

That reminded her, she was going to have to bring up their wedding plans again sometime soon. She was overwhelmed by the things that needed to be done to plan a wedding. There were things she'd never had to use, she'd never known she wanted and she'd never even heard of. Just so many decisions to make before they could get married.

* * *

When she woke up again, Deeks wasn't next to her anymore. He wasn't in the bathroom either so she wandered down the stairs. As she got to the bottom, she leaned against the doorway and just watched her fiancé. He was shirtless, wearing only sweatpants, dancing and singing softly while he emptied the dishwasher of clean dishes. She thought it was absolutely adorable and he didn't even sense her presence.

Finally making her way over to him, she wrapped her arms around his waist. "There you are." She dug her face in between his shoulder blades and kissed his skin.

"Morning." She mumbled. He turned around in her arms and kissed her on the nose. Then proceeded to move down to her lips while his hands went to her waist and gently placed them underneath her shirt. He touched her warm and soft skin right above her hipbone and deepened the kiss.

The dog's bark made them pull apart. It was Monty patiently sitting in front of the door, signaling that he was ready to go for his morning walk. "Perfect timing Monty. Guess we have to get dressed now huh?"

"You bet."

* * *

He wasn't the young and hyper dog she'd met years ago but he still loved his walks. He'd wait by the door for them while they got their shoes and jackets on and practically sprint out the door once it was opened.

Kensi loved walking Monty with Deeks. She didn't always go with him but when she did they'd enjoy their time together. Sometimes they'd joke or banter and sometimes they'd walk in silence but it was quality time for her with Deeks and she enjoyed it either way.

"Alright." He put on his jacket. "You wanna loop around the park today?"

"Yeah, sounds good." She attached Monty's leash, opened the door and stepped into the morning air. They started their walk and Monty happily trotted in front of them.

* * *

They'd just seen Kirkin with his fiancé and found out that he'd bought the gang. Deeks was still kind of shocked as they continued their walk. "Where do you think my doppelgänger is now?"

"Obviously not with Kirkin anymore."

"And he's been taking his money?"

"I guess so, but it looks like he's more into the short-haired brunettes afterall." He chuckled. She had been pestering him the whole time. "No longer into the long-haired… blond… guys. Are you sad? Do you want to talk about?" She was mocking him completely.

"I get it! And I'm not sad about it." He laughed. "It's just so weird that looked so similar to me."

"Don't let it go to your head." She laughed too as they continued to walk. She looked over to him trying to think of a way to bring up what she wanted to talk about but she wasn't sure how. They had fallen into a pleasant silence but she wanted to discuss things with him. "So we should probably talk about the wedding."

"Yeah."

"Why can't we make any definite decisions on it?"

"I don't know."

"There's just so much to think about. We should be deciding things and putting them aside so we can narrow it down."

"Mhm."

"Deeks? Are you listening?"

"Yeah, I am."

She could tell he wasn't really. "What are you thinking about?"

"I don't know."

"Deeks…" She touched his shoulder softly.

"Callen probably thinks I'm a complete ass right now."

She was surprised by the sudden change in mood. "What? Deeks no!"

"You know they only tolerate me because they love you."

She was absolutely shocked. "That's not true."

"Sam has taken years to even gain some respect from and I can't even get Callen to have a drink with me."

"Callen's just like that and Sam… It took awhile but he respects you Deeks. Everyone does. You're one of us, one of the agents."

"You know I'm not. Even Mosley keeps reminding me of it, how I'm a cop and not an agent."

"She just wants to put fear in our minds and that's all she's got on you."

"Yeah and that I'm going to marry my partner."

"So am I. If she seriously had a problem with it, we would've been split up months ago."

"She is splitting us up. Do you see how often we've been partnered with others? Now Callen's gonna think I don't have his back and not want me to stay."

"Where is this insecurity coming from?" He didn't respond. "The team wouldn't be the same without you. We're a family." His eyes were cast downwards and he didn't say anything again. "I can't keep defending them but I can defend myself. You are every part of this team as much as anybody else. You're equal to me and I don't see you any differently. You're an incredible cop and lawyer, and you fight for what's right. You make sure that justice is served and I admire that so much Deeks."

He interjected. "You, you are the one who does that. You haven't crossed the line. I've crossed that line many times. Especially when it comes to you." And he didn't want to do it for Callen, at least that's what it looked like.

She knew exactly what he was talking about. When he tortured the clerk in Afghanistan or punched Sabatino multiple times to get information about her whereabouts. She knew he'd always had that protective nature, even when he was little with shooting his father to protect his Mom and as a young adult when he killed his corrupt partner to save Tiffany. He felt a strong need to protect women, especially women who couldn't save themselves in that moment.

"You protect me and others, in every way. You can help someone with a compliment, a joke or just your smile. You light up people's day, you light up my day everyday. I love you so much Deeks, you don't even know." She ended softly.

"I know Kens, I know." He hugged her. "And I love you so much too." She was wrapped in his arms and could feel the tension slowly leave his body until they felt pressure on their legs.

"And Monty loves you." They looked down at their dog who had caught their attention by standing up on its hind legs.

"Yeah, he does." Deeks perked up as he leant down to pet his four-legged friend. "He's been with me for all of it. Huh, Monty? You've listened to all my late night whining. I used to talk about my crazy partner. She could be so annoying sometimes."

Kensi gawked. "Me annoying?"

He ignored her and continued to speak to Monty. "But you were the first person I admitted to that I was falling in love with my partner." He looked up at her and then stood up and kissed the side of her head. "Thank you for everything Kens."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	17. Chapter 17 (9x17)

Thank you for the kind reviews! There's no new episode this week so I have time to catch up! I love to write things as realistic as possible. Sometimes I think it can get too tedious when I explain things like in this chapter but it's the way I see it in my head :)

This picks up after the seventeenth episode of season 9, _The Monster_ (9x17).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

She swallowed down her disgust but didn't seem to be able to look away. The sight in front of them was horrifying. Innocent people killed by monsters.

"I'm going to throw up." Kensi said releasing her breath.

Sam turned to them. "Why don't you guys go outside and call it in?"

"Okay." Deeks said and did as he was told. They stepped into the fresh air and Kensi seemed okay. He called the wonder twins who then notified Hetty and Mosley and the place was swarming with FBI agents soon after.

Sam and Callen came over to them after they'd briefed the other agents on the situation. "Time to call it a night. They're taking over. We're done."

"Go home, try to get some rest if you can."

* * *

They walked through the door with In-N-Out in their hands. She dumped the bag on the dining room table and went to get herself a glass of water. Deeks had gotten a chocolate shake but she didn't think her stomach could handle it after tonight, she wasn't even that hungry for her burger.

Trying to distract themselves from this evening's events, they looked through several wedding magazines, binders and pamphlets.

"I thought you would've already planned this whole thing with those bridal magazines under your sink for all these years."

She rolled her eyes. "I had no idea what it all entailed. All I thought about was the location, the dress and the guy."

"Did you imagine me as the guy before we were dating?"

She smirked. "A girl doesn't kiss and tell."

"I'll take that as a yes."

"I never realized there was this much to be done, like the font of our initials for the logo of the save-the-date cards. I don't know what to choose, it all looks nice."

"Then just pick one and cross that off the list."

"I need your help though."

"I'm here, I'll make the tough decisions, no problem." He practically shouted enthusiastically like he always did and she laughed.

"Okay good." He pecked her on the lips. "So about today… Hidoko didn't really want to share much."

"Concerning what?"

"Her name."

"That's all?"

"Well that's what I asked about. It seemed like a simple question but she didn't want to say."

"Interesting."

"She also said she's loyal to Mosley even though she knows where we stand. Mosley mentored her so…"

"I respect that. I'd fight for the people I know and have worked with for many years."

"Yeah. Speaking of which, how was working with Sam?"

"It was okay. Just wanted to be with you though, then I could've driven."

"Is that the only reason?"

"Of course not. It's just frustrating. There's no reason we have to split up when Sam's partner isn't there. Just because Callen's out for the day doesn't mean we have to get seperated. That's what partnerships are for, to have trust in somebody, why would she want to mess with two pairs. We work fine with the others but it could be dangerous… and now I'm just ranting."

"It's okay. I totally agree with you Kens. I hate when I can't protect you, I wonder what you're doing all day, if you're safe."

"At least we can text each other."

"We do that a lot huh?"

"Yep." She looked at the wedding stuff in front of her and sighed. "I'm too tired to even keep looking at this stuff. There's too much." She got up with her empty glass and walked to the kitchen.

He knew this wedding planning was stressing her out and he wasn't being much help either. "Then let's stop for tonight."

"I feel like I'm about to fall over." She leaned heavily on the kitchen counter.

"Your adrenal fatigue again." He said as a statement and not as a question. "Let's go to bed."

"I don't know if I'll be able to sleep."

"Come, I'll carry you up the stairs if I have to."

"You don't."

"I'll do anything for my ladybird."

He walked behind her with one hand on her back in case she lost her balance. She would still get these dips sometimes from her adrenal fatigue; when the case was done, the adrenaline was gone and all she felt like was collapsing.

Once up the stairs, he took her hand and led her to their bedroom. He helped her sit down on the bed and got her pj's from under the sheets. He was going to help her but she stopped him. "I got it."

He took off his clothes until he was down to his boxer shorts and then went into the bathroom to brush his teeth.

Kensi came in a few moments later, wearing shorts and a tank top and started brushing her teeth as well.

When he finished, he took the clip out of her hair so that it was down and kissed her cheek.

"I'll be there in a sec." She told him, looking into his eyes through the mirror.

When she was done getting ready for bed, she walked to the bed. They turned off the lights and laid down. She could hear his breathing and it soothed her anxious feeling but she wasn't falling asleep. She stared at the ceiling willing herself to think about positive things. She hadn't seen something so brutal in as long as she could remember and it was hard to process everything that had happened.

He reached down, searching the sheets for her hand and when he found it he latched on. Thinking she'd still be awake, he was proven right when she squeezed his hand. He then moved his body closer to hers and wrapped his arms around her. She turned slightly so that her back was against his chest and wrapped her other hand now in his. He softly kissed her neck and seemed to relax until she could hear his breath even out. He was already asleep because he was exhausted and so was she but even with her adrenal fatigue, sleeping right now seemed impossible.

* * *

Deeks woke up and saw his alarm clock. He must have turned around at some point as he wasn't hugging Kensi any more. When his eyes focused, he could see that it was 2:17AM and the reason he had woken up was because there was a light on. He turned around and saw her sitting up in bed with the light on her nightstand shining.

"Writing in your diary?" He asked as he fully turned himself to see.

"It's a journal." She said softly.

"You can't sleep?" She shook her head. "Have you slept at all?"

"No." She said softly, she hadn't looked up since they started talking instead focusing on her journal. He could see that she'd written both pages full without stopping. She was on the last line of this page and it wasn't her first because he knew how she always started them.

"How many pages have you written?"

"Uhm…" She flipped through the pages. "Six."

"Is it helping?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. When I was younger my mom always made me write in them cause I didn't express my feelings much and it helped, at least I thought it did. I thought it was stupid at first, I felt weird writing down personal things and issues but it got easier. I've been doing this my whole life and now it feels awkward again."

"You haven't done it in a while."

"Yeah I guess."

"Maybe you should start writing regularly again. Just to process everything. It's easier to write than to communicate verbally isn't it?"

She nodded. Communication has never been something she's been very good at, especially when it came to her own feelings.

Deeks saw her open and close her mouth a few times. "Something you want to talk about, Kens?"

She sighed. "I'm really freaked out."

"It's okay. So am I."

"I knew something was up with that guy. I should've known."

"Kens, don't do this. You couldn't have thought of that. They're very evil and manipulative people."

"There was something off about him. They could've done something. We were outnumbered."

"You're a trained special agent. I've seen you take down people twice your size. You would've been okay."

"Weir wasn't and he was a Navy Lieutenant Commander." She had a good point.

"You're safe Kens. I'm so thankful for that and hopefully the FBI can solve this case quickly so they don't hurt anymore innocent people."

She agreed, she was glad they weren't the agency that had to continue investigating this case.

"Are you at a point you can stop writing?" She looked at her journal, there was still so much she could write about. "Tomorrow's always another day. You can continue in the morning but you need to try and rest. Sleep is crucial if we want to function in the morning."

"Okay." She sighed and shut her book. Putting it on her nightstand, she shut off the light. She moved herself lower so she was laying down and he pulled her closer.

He wrapped his arms around her and she placed her head in the crook of his neck. Her hand moved onto his chest right above his heart. She felt safe, his body heat and heartbeat soothed her worries until she could finally fall into a peaceful bout of sleep.

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	18. Chapter 18 (9x18)

Thank you so much for the nice reviews! We're getting a season 10! I'm so excited!

Everytime I think I'm not going to have much to write, I end up with a lot. Of course this took forever to write even though I had a week in between to catch up. So sorry this is now 3 weeks later and you've probably forgotten what the episode was even about!

There's a lot of wedding talk in this chapter and I put in a scene that I've had in my head for much longer than season 9 but it seemed like it would fit in here nicely!

This picks up after the eighteenth episode of season 9, _Vendetta_ (9x18).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

They'd stopped for some groceries on the way home from work so he went straight to the kitchen and put it all away. Arkady had actually helped them today and seemed really concerned about Vladlena. They'd been to her gambling place and won lots of jewelry just a few months before which probably lead to all of this so he felt kind of bad.

When he finished putting everything away, he finally noticed that Kensi wasn't in the living room anymore. He decided to grab a beer, sit on the couch and turn on the tv. She came back downstairs and he saw that she had changed. Now in her sweats and a long sleeve t-shirt that fit her nicely, she approached him.

"Hey."

"Hey." He moved a cushion out of the spot for her to sit down. "I was gonna start a movie." She had no response, instead just opened up her phone and sat next to him. "Are you okay?" He asked hesitantly because he wasn't sure why she was being quiet.

"I'm fine." She said not looking up from her phone as he watched. He knew she wasn't and was racking his brain to think of what could be wrong.

"Did I do something?" He wasn't sure but she was quick to respond.

"Nope."

He thought about the day and what could have irritated her and then it came to mind. "Is this about the restaurant?"

When she sighed and put down her phone, he knew he had hit the spot. That was it. He thought it could've gone either way but this time she was mad.

"Why didn't you tell me you went there?" She sat up a little straighter.

He shrugged. "I don't know. It didn't feel like the right place."

"Shouldn't we be making those decisions together?"

"Well what did you think of it?"

"That's not the point Deeks!"

"I'm showing interest in the wedding planning."

"Without me!" She practically shouted at him but sat back in shock of her own behavior.

"I don't understand, I thought you didn't really care what we did either." He said gently.

"Of course I do! This is a special day and I want it to be perfect." He sighed knowing it was so much more than just the restaurant. "When did you even go?" She asked dejectedly.

"You were having one of your girl's nights so I went to check it out. It wasn't a big deal." She looked down. "Kens, I'm sorry. I just had dinner, asked some questions and decided it wasn't the right place for us. It didn't seem relevant to tell you cause I didn't like it. What did you really think of it?"

She shook her head. "It's too fancy."

"I'm really sorry. I thought I could check something off our list, participate in all this so we can move on."

"This is part of the process, not moving on as quickly as possible. It's a huge step in our relationship. We get to do this together, plan what we want and then when the day comes, enjoy it." She played with the hem of her shirt.

"Hey." He touched her arm to get her to look at him. "I promise I'll include you in my ideas next time and we'll make decisions together."

She smiled. "Okay."

He looked around. "Seems like this wedding stuff is everywhere now." He reached for a binder that was in front of him on the coffee table.

"That's cause it is."

He opened the binder to the first page which had a checklist of everything that had to be done. He skimmed through it stopping at the last item. It was written in her hand writing instead of typed like all the others. The topic surprised him so he asked about it.

"Who do you want to walk you down the aisle?"

She shrugged. "I don't know, I haven't thought about it yet." He knew that couldn't be true, she had obviously remembered it when she added it to the list. Her father couldn't walk her down the aisle so she was going to ask Granger, but now she had to decide again.

"We'll figure this all out, Kens. It'll be the best day." She agreed as he took another look at the list. "I've never been to your father's grave, maybe we could go visit it this weekend?"

"That would be nice."

"Okay, we have a plan."

"We have a plan."

* * *

They got up early on Saturday morning to make the drive down. The cemetery was close to Camp Pendleton, near San Diego and took close to two hours to get to without traffic.

They drove through the gates and she slowed down. "Uhm I think it's this way." She looked which road to take. "It looks different around here."

"When was the last time you were here?"

"Uh, it's been a couple years. Last year I was in a coma and paralyzed for most of it, I couldn't drive so I didn't go."

"You know you could've asked me. I would've driven you."

"I know."

The car came to a halt as she looked to her right. She parked, he grabbed the flowers and they got out. They walked through the grass along the graves and searched for his name until they found it.

She stood in silence as she read the writing on the stone for the hundredth time over the course of her life and Deeks waited patiently to see what she would say or do next. He laid a comforting hand on her back to let her know he was there for her and it brought her attention back to the present.

"There's so many memories coming to mind." Putting her bag down, she looked down at the note in her shaking hands and opened it. "I usually read my letter out loud but that would be kind of awkward."

"You can do whatever you want baby, you don't have to be embarrassed about anything. I can wait at the car and let you talk if you want."

"No, it's okay." She folded the paper back together and placed it with the flowers. Stepping back, she took a deep breath. "So many people came to the funeral but it's all such a blur to me now. All the days after that night are a blur. But I remember that night and morning vividly."

"What happened?" She looked at the grave and he took her silence as hesitation. "You don't have to tell me."

"No, I want to. I don't think I've ever told anyone the full story." He waited for her to continue. "I woke up to the doorbell ringing. It was dark and when I looked at the clock, it was 5:22 in the morning. I went to my dad's bedroom but he wasn't there so I walked downstairs and opened the door. It was the police… They had me sit down and then told me that he had possibly passed away… And I didn't believe them, it couldn't be true. I needed proof but we had to wait for dental records. I stayed with family friends as they tried to contact my mom. First I told them she had died but then I gave them her old phone number even though I knew she was using a different one. I never wanted to talk to her again but I know my dad did talk to her to say how I was doing."

"That night we had had this huge fight before he left. I wanted to go see Titanic with my friends and he wouldn't let me go out. And when he said he was going to go have drinks with his buddies, I was so angry." She got choked up at the end. "Uhm… So I went anyways. After he left, I snuck out, saw the movie and came home before him. I was so proud of myself for making it back in time, but it was pointless cause he never came home again." She was on the verge of losing it but kept speaking. "And for the longest time I thought he died because of me. The last words I said to him…" She broke and the tears that had been glistening on the rim of her eyes fell.

He could see that this was too much so he pulled her in for a hug. "Kens, it's okay. You don't have to say it." He rubbed circles on her back. "And this was never your fault."

"I know."

"I get that it can feel that way but it was because of Clairmont, a horrible person." She nodded her head into his shoulder. "You figured it out, you solved his murder and you brought Clairmont to justice."

They stood there in silence until she finally composed herself and pulled back. "It's partly why I became an agent, to find out more about my father's case and find his murderer. But also because I wanted others to know what had happened to their loved ones. If I could solve a case for somebody and bring at least some peace to one family, that's all I could hope for."

"It's a huge part of who you are and has consumed most of your life."

She nodded. "When I was little I wanted to be a bounty hunter. My dad always supported me in my dreams even though I know he didn't think I would become that. But little does he know I'm probably closer than he could have ever expected." She laughed softly.

"He knows Kens."

"Yeah." She looked into his eyes. "I think I'm ready to go."

"Okay."

She turned to face the grave and whispered. "Bye Daddy. I love you."

With one last look at Deeks she started walking back to the car. He followed and put his arm around her. Getting to the car she realized she was missing something.

"Ugh I forgot my bag."

"I'll get it."

"Thanks." She was relieved that she could sit down in the passenger seat because she was emotionally exhausted.

He made his way to the grave walking through the grass further and further away from Kensi again. Picking up the purse he was about to walk away when he turned back to the grave.

He cleared his throat. "Uh… this is kind of awkward, like Kensi said. I'm Marty but you probably already knew that." He laughed embarrassed. "I wanted to get your blessing to marry your daughter. Of course you can't reply but I just wanted you to know that I will take care of her, protect her and love her with all my heart." He finished his statement with a nod and then went back to the car.

Back at the car he handed her the purse and she gave him the keys. Since they hadn't been down there very long, they decided to go to the beach. They parked and walked onto the sand. Sitting down, they watched the other beach-goers on this busy Saturday afternoon. There were people surfing in the water, couples tanning in the sun and kids playing in the sand. She had been quiet on the short drive here but he understood that she had had an emotional day so far.

"Thank you for telling me about everything. I know how hard it is to talk about the past."

There was one more thing she hadn't said yet. "Uhm...That night I told him I hated him but that was never true."

He pulled her into his side and wrapped his arm around her. "He knows. He knows you love him so much and he knew it then and he knows it now. You're his baby girl… forever."

She smiled at that. He always knew exactly what to say to make her feel better. "Thank you for being patient with me." He smiled at what she said this time. It's what she had asked of him years ago.

"Well thank you for being bold." They would've never been at this point in their relationship if she hadn't made that leap the day on the ice.

"You're bold too."

"We're bold together."

She laid her head on his shoulder. "We are."

* * *

Thanks for reading! Hope you liked it!


	19. Chapter 19 (9x19)

Thank you so much for reading my story everyone! This chapter is a little shorter than the others because I'm very behind on these! I'm not sure if a Cynical podcast exists or what it's about so I hope I didn't make any mistakes. Hahaha!

This picks up after the nineteenth episode of season 9, _Outside the Lines_ (9x19).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

They agreed to have some drinks and burgers after work but since Deeks left before she got up in the morning, they had to take separate cars.

"I'll meet you there."

"Okay." She pecked him on the lips before walking farther through the parking lot to where her car was in the last row.

As he was backing up the car, he saw Kensi waving to Hidoko and then walking towards her. He assumed they would talk for a moment so he went ahead and left to get them a table.

She shouted across the parking lot. "Hidoko!"

"Hey." The other agent turned around slowly.

"Hi. Just wanted to see if you were okay."

"I am." She reassured Kensi. "Long day though." She exhaled.

"It was. I'm glad you're safe."

"Me too. A thousand images flashed in front of me in that moment. If that jacket hadn't had kevlar in it, I probably wouldn't be here."

"Hetty has a good reason for everything." Kensi looked at Hidoko's tired stance. "Well I'm sure you're exhausted but Deeks and I are going out to have burgers and beers if you wanted to come."

"Sounds fun thank you but I'm going to get some sleep."

"I understand, see you tomorrow."

* * *

She arrived at the restaurant and walked through the door. Looking around for the golden locks she loved, her eyes finally landed on him in the corner booth. He waved when they made eye contact and she made her way over to him.

"Hey, I already ordered your favorite burger."

"Great thanks."

"Did you ask Hidoko to come?"

"Yeah but she said she was going home to rest."

"Cracked ribs, oof that hurts."

"They're the worst. It was a close call Deeks, without that jacket… she was hit right in the chest. She had no time to think, let alone react differently."

"You ever been in that situation?"

"Of course, it comes with the job."

"But you were lucky."

"Mhm."

"You ever think one day we might not be so lucky?"

She knew what he was asking but she didn't really know what to say. "I don't know Deeks, I don't think luck has been on my side for a couple years now."

"It could have been much worse. You're lucky to be alive." He stared at his drink. "I could have lost you."

"But you didn't because we're trained for situations like that, we know what to do."

"Not when you have no time to react."

She knew this could turn into a long conversation about wanting to quit but she honestly wasn't ready yet. She'd told him that before and she didn't want to have to say it again. Thankfully the food was delivered at this moment and she took the opportunity to talk about something else.

"Nell did great today. She rocked the homeless undercover."

"Did she live up to my legacy?" He went along with the topic change.

"Totally. Although the Artie outfit is hard to beat."

"It takes dedication." He said semi-seriously.

"It does."

"I had a good heart to heart talk with Callen today."

"Yeah? That's good." She popped a french fry into her mouth.

"Yeah, it is." He wasn't going into much detail about what he and Callen had discussed because he hadn't told her about his wish to buy a bar.

"I know you wanted to have drinks with him a couple years ago but he left without saying anything."

"Mhm, of course this time we had to be at the bar so it doesn't really count as willingly hanging out."

"It's a start." She held up her beer to him.

"That is true." They clinked their beer bottles together and drank.

"So on another note, while you were already gone this morning, I finished the Cynical podcast…"

"Oh did you like it?"

"I loved it. It was so good."

"I agree, it was fantastic." He said genuinely.

"And I can't believe nobody knew the mom was a twin. It was so obvious."

"Right? They all seemed clueless."

When the excitement died down, she got a soft smile on her face. "Ah, I'm so glad you're enthusiastic about it?"

"Why's that?"

"Because this morning I was all excited to talk to the team about it and they kind of shot me down. Apparently it was old news I was late to the party."

"It is an old podcast." He agreed with the team.

"Well they said I get upset when I see that they don't want to talk about something that happened a while back."

"You are upset right now." He pointed out.

"I'm upset cause they think I get upset not because I am upset about them not being excited." He had to hold back the smile that was forcing itself on his face. His girl could be so stubborn sometimes. "And I can't believe you've already seen Star Wars without me. Where was I this time?" Somehow she'd missed a lot of things lately.

"Who told you that?" She glared at him. "Kens it's April, the movie came out in December."

"Again, where was I?"

"I don't know. Hanging out with friends probably."

"Don't you think it's kind of weird that you didn't mention it to me?"

"Nah, it wasn't a big deal"

"Really?" She was skeptical.

"Okay, the team asked both of us to tag along and see the film but I knew you had plans already and I also knew that if I waited to see it with you, I would not be seeing it until now. I wanted to watch it and I didn't want to hurt your feelings. Let's face it, you're late to the party whether it's a couple of months or a year and a half."

She punched his shoulder lightly. "I'm not late to the party." She said defiantly.

"You kind of are."

"Somehow everyone has forgotten that I was in a coma last year and couldn't walk."

"Not to be a stickler for detail but you had plenty of downtime at the hospital to listen to a podcast."

"I was doing other things."

"Just admit it Kens, you're just a little behind on some things." She rolled her eyes and he had to laugh. "Hey, if you want to watch Star Wars we can buy it and watch it tonight."

"You've already seen it."

"I know but I don't mind watching it again. It's a good movie."

"Okay fine." She pretended not to care but she had actually been looking forward to seeing the film.

"So you want to talk some more about the Cynical podcast?"

"Yes! I have so many things I want to discuss." He listened to her ramble about it and just knew the rest of the night would be good.

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	20. Chapter 20 (9x20)

Thank you so much for reading my story! I find it very hard to write the whole team in one setting. I tried to have some smaller conversations amongst them but I don't really like how it connects. Anyway, I hope you enjoy!

This picks up after the twentieth episode of season 9, _Reentry_ (9x20).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

They all met at the bar for drinks after the long day to relax in the presence of each other. Once the drinks arrived, they all held them up. "Cheers to another day and another case."

"Cheers!" They shouted and took a sip.

"I'm exhausted, that drive was so long." Nell shared.

"It was." Sam agreed.

"You're one to talk, you didn't even drive." Callen said sarcastically.

"I had to sit next to you." Sam retorted.

"Sleep, you were sleeping."

The rest of them watched, amused by the banter between the two senior agents.

"I'm so hungry. Should we have sliders?" Kensi pondered while looking at the menu.

"Of course Kens. I'll go order them." Deeks offered.

"Oh I want to try some of those new garlic fries, I'll come with you." Callen followed. "So is this the kind of place you'd like your bar to look like?" He asked when they were out of earshot from the rest.

"Yeah this is nice. Of course there's lots of things I'd do differently as far as the interior look but I like it."

"You've put a lot of thought into this already." He stated.

"Please don't tell Kensi about it."

"Don't tell me about what?" He jumped at the sound of her voice.

"Donuts!"

"Donuts? I love talking about donuts."

"See what you did Callen? Now she'll want to eat donuts."

"Actually, I want an order of those garlic fries too."

"Well that we can do." Callen said as he gave Deeks a look.

"Yep, definitely." Deeks quickly made an exit.

"What was that?" She said perplexed.

"I honestly have no idea." He shook his head. "Your fiancé's acting weird."

"My fiancé is weird." They both smiled because they'd had this conversation so many times before but now it was fiancé.

* * *

Dumping all her stuff beside the door, she turned to him. "Are you going to watch more of your boat film?"

"Ah I think you mean Hellemofjorden Ferje."

"Such a showoff."

"Just getting down to my Scandinavian roots."

"You're making this into so much more than it is."

"You're complaining about it but you didn't really watch it with me yesterday."

"I saw you sit on the couch for eight hours."

"Eight relaxing hours."

"How can you do nothing for so long?"

"Sometimes you just need to do nothing for a day. Aren't you ever so exhausted that you can't move anymore?"

"Well yeah of course, but it doesn't mean I watch a boat film, I go to sleep."

"You can watch it before you sleep to calm you down. You have to at least try it before judging."

"Fine. Put it on." She gave in.

"Really? You're gonna watch it with me?"

"I'll try."

He enthusiastically turned on the tv, searched for it and hit play. She busied herself in the kitchen until the movie was fully started. Not that she was waiting for the good part because it was just hours of the same thing. When she came over to the couch, she sat next to him and looked at the tv. It was like nothing she'd ever seen before and not in a good way. She honestly did not understand how he could watch this.

He could see her becoming restless and glancing over at him every few seconds. Moving his arm to go around her shoulders, they met each other's eyes.

"Relax." He massaged her shoulders. "It's a good way to unwind after a case. It was an eventful day, seeing me in those tight white golf pants must have been exciting." Humor was the best way to go because it made her smile.

"I have to admit it made my heart beat faster."

"Yeah? You thought I looked good?"

"Super sexy."

She put her feet up on the couch and then lowered her head onto his lap facing the tv so she could still watch. She was getting more comfortable and he moved his hand to rest on her side.

"Have you ever been to Norway?" She asked.

"No, we never really went on holidays growing up."

"Yeah, I get that." She knew they didn't go anywhere when his father was still in the picture. "I've never been either. What was the best holiday you ever had?"

"Mammoth 2014."

A soft smile graced her lips. "That's mine too. But what about before me?"

"Summer after college a group of us went to Hawaii and just surfed all week. That was the best."

"Sounds like fun." She turned her head to look at him before focusing her eyes on the tv again.

"My mom was so proud that I passed everything to become a lawyer, she bought me a suitcase for the trip." He smiled at the memory. "Of course she was less happy when I quit my job and decided to become a cop."

"Moms are protective of their kids." She said softly.

"Tell me about."

"It's a dangerous job."

"It is. Very high paced, always on the go, not much time to rest. The slow movement is like taking a step back from life and just appreciating the little things."

"More like putting me to sleep."

"Isn't that part of the beauty of it though? You can fall asleep peacefully." He moved his hands through her hair.

"Mmm, that's nice." Her words were slurred.

It wasn't about the movie itself but the idea of it. Taking the time to realize how fast everything around him was happening. His job was highly stressful and action packed and he needed the opposite to balance it out. It was appreciating the fact that good things took time. Being in a relationship with Kensi took him almost six years and getting engaged took him too long, according to Kensi, as well.

Everyone needs their own way of coping with everyday stress and this was something that worked for him. He could stare at the screen and contemplate ideas about the future or reminisce in memories from the past. And these were the exact kind of moments he loved with his fiancée. Not talking about work but just basking in each other's presence.

He had noticed that her responses had gotten shorter as time went on and when he finally looked down at his fiancée, he saw her eyes closed. She had fallen asleep to the boat moving across the water slowly and proven just what it was all about.

"Goodnight beautiful."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	21. Chapter 21 (9x21)

**Make sure to check out the last chapter if you haven't yet, I posted it Saturday.** I am caught up again! But the next couple of weeks are going to be hard because I have finals coming up so hopefully I'll be able to finish after that. Only one more Sundays with episodes and the season will be over! Can't wait to watch the two-hour finale! The promo looks so intense! Hopefully it won't end in a cliffhanger hahaha don't know how I could write a fanfic with that!

Another bar scene cause that's what the episodes decided on! Hahaha! Deeks actually bought a bar, I can't believe it. I loved the scene at the end with the team. Kensi and Deeks looked so happy and she was wearing her engagement ring! I love those little details on the show! I'm excited to see how that all plays out in season 10!

This picks up after the twenty first episode of season 9, _Where Everybody Knows Your Name_ (9x21).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

The team put down their drinks after their second taste of it because it just wasn't worth drinking. "I've got some work to do of course." He lifted up his bad-tasting beer.

"Well show us what you're thinking to do with the place."

"First of all, I'm going to need a fridge and I need electricity to be up and running." He looked at everything and then walked around the bar to the otherside of the place. "I think the wood needs some fixing up and maybe some more tables over here. This wall needs to be painted and I was thinking a pool table would fit nicely in this spot."

Kensi watched as he walked around and spoke. It was as if he was talking through his ideas on his own without the rest of them there. She could see him painting the picture in his head, exactly the way he wanted it.

"I think it's good. Nice size, great potential." Sam said moving his hand along the wood.

"Thanks." He turned to the team again. "I'm excited to see how it all goes."

"I'm excited for you guys. We'll have a place to come after work."

"Yeah and we'll expect free drinks." Callen added.

"You got it." They embraced in a brotherly hug and then moved over to Kensi.

"You good?"

"Yes." She nodded her head.

Hidoko decided to leave with Sam and Callen as well, leaving just Nell and Eric.

"Big commitment." Nell stated.

"Not as big of a commitment as a puppy." Eric added.

"What is it with you and puppies?" Kensi wondered just as she did when he asked if they were getting a puppy when they moved in together.

"They're a lot of work."

"I'm so happy for you guys, Kens."

"Thanks Nell."

"See you at work." They waved.

Eric placed his hand on the small of Nell's back on the way out. Kensi's heels clinked against the wood floors, echoing in the now empty room, as she walked over to him.

"I can't believe you're doing this!"

"I'm going to need your help."

"Well of course but you're actually following through on a plan."

"You sound so shocked."

"I am, you always tell me about all these crazy ideas and this time you're making it happen."

"This is something I really want to do."

"I can tell."

"For a second there I thought you were going to walk out of the bar."

She laughed. "Not gonna lie, I thought about it. I was shocked. It sort of came out of nowhere."

"I know. I'm sorry."

"Don't do it again." She said smiling but there was a serious undertone to her voice.

"I promise."

"You know you can tell me about your plans right?"

"Yeah well I did this morning." He defended.

"I didn't know this was a serious plan. You come up with things everyday."

"I know, I should have told you." He held her hands and looked down at them. He gently moved his thumb over the engagement ring and smiled. "I honestly needed the team there for my protection in case you were gonna use these hands to harm me. I'm glad it didn't go wrong though."

"I would never do that. I would've rather walked out of here."

"Touché."

"Touché." She repeated and he made a face. As long as he kept squirming when she said it wrong, she would continue saying it incorrectly.

He decided to let it go and change topics. "Maybe we could have a dance floor here." He tugged on her hand and pulled her towards him as he started swaying them back and forth. "You and the cupcake girls can show off those dancing skills."

"Kat, Mindy, Mandy, Tiffany and Tiffany are going to love this. I need to tell them right away." The ideas were coming now. "We're gonna have to have great food. That's a must!"

"You're going to be tasting all kinds of foods deciding which ones to serve."

"You bet. I can't wait."

"Are you really okay with all this?"

She looked around and then back into his eyes. "I am." She said but she looked worried. "I know you want to do something other than law enforcement, I guess it's just starting to really sink in now."

"I haven't left yet. We're still partners." She nodded. "And we can still have whatever we want at the wedding." Thinking that might be part of her hesitation.

"Well I don't want to go overboard. We need to save money now."

"I have some extra money from the Ethercoin."

"I know you said this is an investment cause it is but we're going to have to put a lot of money into this too and then hope we can make profit."

"We will."

"I have no doubt you can make it happen but it's a lot of work Deeks and this place needs a lot of work. We hardly have spare time as it is and we're planning a wedding."

"Nothing's going to change in that. We will plan the wedding and then we'll slowly start working on things around here." She still looked hesitant. "I get that this is a huge step, I'm still wrapping my head around it myself." He looked into her eyes. "I know that bars are the places where my father would get drunk but it doesn't always have to be negative. We go out with the team to celebrate the end of a case and it's good, it's a place for happiness. Uhm… I don't want it to be seen negatively. I want people to be happy when they leave here."

She smiled as her eyes watered. "You're such a good man Marty Deeks."

He got slightly embarrassed and stared at their hands again. She pulled her hand away and lifted it to his cheek. She then stood on her toes slightly and kissed him softly. Releasing her other hand from his, she reached to pull his head closer to hers. They deepened the kiss and he moved his hands to her side. Their kisses continued fiercely, both knowing that they were about to start another important chapter of their lives.

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	22. Chapter 22 (9x22)

This has been a long time coming and you've all probably forgotten about this episode since the finale was so big and exciting but I'm finally getting to it. The next chapter will be up soon.

This is a shorter chapter than usual because I wasn't really sure what to write about. Just some sweet densi before the finale and it all changed hahaha! They talked about wedding ideas so I continued with that a little bit and added some Monty because we don't see him very much.

This picks up after the twenty second episode of season 9, _Venganza_ (9x22).

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

They arrived home with take out and walked up the driveway.

"Bulgogi." He shook his shoulders doing her bulgogi dance. "Aaaah, everything hurts."

"That was quite a tumble today."

"Yeah, it was a big hill. Why did I suggest we jump down it again?"

"Because we wouldn't be here now otherwise." She unlocked the door.

"Oooh Monty smells the food." Deeks held the bag higher as Monty was leaning against Deeks on his hind legs.

"I'll take it." Kensi took the bag of food from Deeks so he could pet Monty.

"You're doing so well, aren't you Monty boy?" Monty laid down and turned so he could get a tummy rub. "He's acting the way he did when he was younger."

"He's feeling better." There always seemed to be something wrong with the aging dog. Kensi came over after she had set everything on the dining room table and Monty moved his attention towards her quickly. She sat on her knees and Monty gave her kisses. "Such a good boy."

"He loves you so much."

"I'm his favorite."

"I wouldn't go that far. Monty and I are a team."

"Okay, team shaggy." She laughed.

Deeks stood up. "Time for some fire meat."

They ate their food and made small-talk. She then opened her laptop as he cleared to table. When he came back, he watched his finacée busy on the computer with a small smile on her face. "What are you looking at?"

She looked up and turned the screen towards him. "The restaurant. They rent out the rooms and the patio and have catering. Clam chowder and fish and chips, exactly what I thought."

"That sounds perfect."

"It is perfect." She went back to looking at the website of the restaurant and then opened another tab. "We'll need to get a permit for the beach in front of the restaurant but we'll need to set a date first."

Her not-so-subtle hint made him laugh. "Yes, we need to set a date."

"Then we'll have the ceremony on the sand, walk up to the restaurant and have the reception there. It's great."

The look he saw on her face showed pure excitement. He could already imagine the wedding in his head. The ocean breeze in his hair as he waited, the guests seated as the bridal party came down the aisle and her dress flowing as she walked towards him.

"Have you picked a dress?"

"Not yet, but I've been looking and have some ideas."

"You're going to look beautiful, just like always."

Trying to keep the blush of her face, she smirked. "You're such a hopeless romantic."

"I'm not hopeless, just a romantic." He whispered the last part as he leaned over to kiss her.

She reached up to hold his jaw deepening the kiss and he held onto her waist to prevent her from falling back. When air became an issue, they had to pull apart. "Wanna take a shower?"

Trying to catch her breath, all she could do was nod so he led her upstairs. He turned on the water, they undressed and stepped in.

The hot water cascading over their bodies as the steam was going up to the ceiling.

"It stings." He laughed through the pain as the water hit his back.

"Turn around." She commanded and he complied. "It looks exactly like a rug burn." She lightly touched the spot and he hissed. "Sorry."

"I'm good. It'll heal quickly."

"Yeah." She moved her hands down his entire back looking at all the tiny scrapes and scars that he had accumulated over the years, before he turned around again to look at her.

"You want me to wash your hair?"

She smiled and nodded. "Yes, please."

He reached over to the eleven neatly-placed shampoo bottles in a basket in the corner and got her favorite one. After his little outburst last year, she had bought the basket to organize all her things so they wouldn't be all over the place anymore.

"That lavender smell." He smelled the scent of the shampoo.

"My favorite."

She flinched when he moved his hand over her head. "You okay?"

"Yeah."

"Did you hit your head Kens? There were some big rocks."

"No." He looked her straight in the eye. "It's not bad."

"Okay." He chose to trust her words.

She closed her eyes enjoying the feeling of his hands moving her hair around as he massaged the shampoo into her hair, avoiding the spot he knew hurt. He then shifted her body around so that the shampoo could be washed out by the hot stream of water.

"I'd return the head massage but I'm sure you wouldn't want my 'chemical' filled shampoos in your natural-oiled hair." The tone of her voice clearly mocking him.

"That is correct. You know me so well."

She lifted her arms around her neck and leaned in for a kiss. He wrapped his arms around her waist and back leaving no room between them. Pulling the lips apart she rested her head on his shoulder.

"I love you so much."

"I love you too."

* * *

Thanks for reading!


	23. Chapter 23 (9x23) & (9x24) Part 1

WOW the finale was intense! We've been left with so many cliffhangers. These are the last two chapters for this story! I split it up into two parts, where the first episode would have normally ended.

I tried to give Hetty some wise lines as she always has on the show but let's be honest I'm not as wise as Hetty. There are also a lot of lines describing Kensi and Deeks' thoughts.

This picks up after the twenty third and twenty fourth episodes of season 9, _A Line in the Sand_ and _Ninguna Salida_ (9x23) & (9x24). PART 1!

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

" _I'm hit."_

Sam's voice was heard again in their ear pieces. "I'm coming to you right now Sam." Callen said. "Kens, take the suspect, Deeks with me."

Callen ran inside the building and Deeks followed. They walked through the halls with caution but urgency. Proceeding up the stairs and upstairs level until they saw Sam sitting on the ground.

"Hey Sam, you're going to be okay. Deeks hold this on the wound." Callen handed him a towel while he checked for more bullet wounds.

"I've been shot." Sam said.

"We know, we can see it. Medical help is on the way." Deeks reassured him even though Sam wasn't looking too good.

"Sam, stay with me." Callen said with urgency as Sam's eyes were closing.

"There's so much blood." Deeks noted the obvious.

"Eric how far out is the ambulance?" Callen spoke through his ear piece.

"Three minutes."

"Sam, Sam you there." Callen tapped on his face but only got slurs back. "Stay with me Sam, help's almost here."

Once the paramedics got there, everything became a blur. They assessed, hoisted and lifted him down the stairs.

"I'm going to go with him and I'll meet you at the boatshed later." Callen climbed into the ambulance and Sam was transported to the hospital.

"Okay." The place was now swarming with law enforcement checking out the scene as Deeks and Kensi were left standing there.

"We've got a suspect to take care of."

* * *

Kensi and Deeks brought their suspect back to the boatshed and sat him down in the chair.

"You see what she did to my face." He snarled.

"Shut up."

"It's illegal, I know my rights."

"Stop talking." Deeks said in a menacing voice and then exited the interrogation room. "What the hell is she doing Kens?"

"I don't know. She's desperate but for what?"

"Something about Williams."

"Look at his face." They turned to the monitor. "We can't lie in the report."

"Let's just wait and see what Callen says."

"We need to know what's going on. There's something they're not telling us. Have you noticed?"

"Of course I have."

"Callen knows more than he's telling us."

"I know but we have to follow orders regardless." They looked at each other and Kensi could tell that Deeks wasn't happy about that. It wasn't what they thought but they were going to have to deal.

* * *

She was fuming with anger and confusion as she walked back through the mission's doors. Now he didn't think they should be getting married and he states that right in the middle of a dangerous case. He's been fired and she's on her own without her partner.

Out of nowhere Hetty appears in front of her. "This way my dear." She motions her to come with her finger. "Have a seat."

"I don't…" - want any tea - was what she couldn't say before Hetty had already started pouring the tea into her cup.

"Let's talk."

"I don't need to talk."

"Then don't, I will." Hetty gave her a pointed look and she just waited for her to start. "Sometimes we lose our tempers when we're passionate about something, when we care about someone. We can't take things for granted. Before we know it, things that are important to us get taken away. In one second everything can change." Kensi knew that all too well. "Life takes its turns and nothing can be done but hope that we can come back stronger than before."

It scared Kensi, no it terrified her. She's said she'd go to the ends of earth for Deeks but she let him go tonight. They always came out stronger in the end however this time she wasn't so sure.

Kensi continued to listen. "The Executive Assistant Director is in a very difficult position and will do anything in her power to find her son. She will remove anybody who gets in her way no matter the consequences."

Mosley was choosing her family over the job. She could get fired for her actions but would do anything for her son. Kensi couldn't leave the job behind when her family, her Deeks, had asked her to. She had chosen her job over him or that's how it felt. She didn't mean for it to look that way to him but this job is what made her who she was.

She'd already spent a lot of her career trying to figure out why and by whom her father had been murdered, one of the main reasons she joined ncis, but it had turned into much more. She likes protecting people, it gives her a purpose she doesn't know she could fulfill doing something else.

She didn't want to be the lady who spent her career looking for her loved one again because of the dangers and lifestyle this job provided but she also didn't want to be the lady who was angry and had nothing to live for at the end of the day. She understood where Mosley was coming from but it angered her that she had taken it out on them. She loved this job so much.

"But when is it enough?" She whispered to herself but Hetty had heard.

"That is something only you can decide." She stared at her through her round glasses. "This isn't a job you can do forever, it's about finding the right balance and knowing when to move on before it's too late."

Hetty always said things to make her think but this wasn't the time to debate all her possibilities. She needed to focus on her work. "Once you've been briefed, you may sleep in the gym, there are some beds set up there."

She nodded and stood up. "Thank you." She said softly and walked away quickly.

Her mind still reeling at everything that was going on, she didn't notice anything as she walked towards the gym. "What's wrong?" Callen asked as she whizzed past him.

"Nothing." She replied without turning to look at him. The air was filled with tension.

* * *

Except for the light that goes on automatically each day, the house was dark. He stood against the closed front door and tried to process what had just happened. Mosley had fired him and had him escorted from the premises. Mosley may have thought he was disrespectful but he has felt disrespected since the day she started.

His thoughts were interrupted when his phone dinged so he walked over to the couch with the intention of sitting down when he took out his phone, seeing only a text that said Kensi was staying at work tonight.

They weren't going to be able to continue their conversation that evening and he didn't know where they stood now. He took the closest object, which happened to be the tv remote, and threw it across the room. The impact on the wall, sending the back cover and batteries flying in different directions.

Not even turning the lights on, he sat down on the edge of the couch and leaned his head on his hands. If she just hadn't come to talk to him when he was sent away, they wouldn't be in such a negative place now.

Somehow they always got into these deep conversations before they were ready or had the time to really discuss it. But then again these were conversations they needed to have if they weren't going to be on the same page. He thought they were and that's why it came as such a surprise. Deep down maybe he knew they weren't, she had never given him a concrete answer but they had talked about it a lot.

He knew she loved being partners, so did he but it didn't define them, or so he thought.

He was ready to hang up his blue uniform but she wasn't ready to hand in her badge. Their priorities weren't on the same page and the dangers of the job didn't seem to resonate with the same intensity for each of them.

Stuck in his thoughts, he would now lay awake wondering if she would still let him know when they were heading to Mexico.

* * *

Thanks for reading part 1! Continue with part 2 now!


	24. Chapter 24 (9x23) & (9x24) Part 2

**Make sure to check out the last chapter** if you haven't yet, I published it at the same time because it's in two parts.

I wasn't totally sure what to write for these episodes since it isn't a post-ep add-on with the major cliffhanger at the end so I added some missing scenes in between.

I created a couple more disagreements in this because I do love some densi drama as long as they get a happy ending. Season 10 please let them figure out their future quickly hahahaha!

This picks up after the twenty third and twenty fourth episodes of season 9, _A Line in the Sand_ and _Ninguna Salida_ (9x23) & (9x24). PART 2!

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:LA.

* * *

After Deeks' last sentence, the plane ride was mostly silent, only the occasional words spoken between Callen and Sam. The flight wasn't long but to them it felt like it lasted forever. Kensi kept sneaking looks at Deeks but he wasn't looking at her. He was staring at the other side of the plane trying his best not to awkwardly make their eyes meet. She felt like she wanted to cry, she missed not sitting next to him and not being able to hold his hand or lean her head on his shoulder.

She knew that Callen and Sam had noticed the tension between them. It would be hard to miss. They weren't sitting side by side and they hadn't spoken at all. She wondered how Callen felt with his team not being a hundred percent. They were fighting, Sam was injured and he wasn't on Mosley's good side now. She had questioned his integrity and as the leader of the team that must've felt horrible.

She'd had trouble falling asleep last night and by the looks of it so did he. He had now shut his eyes and leaned his head back against the chair. She knew she had disappointed him but she couldn't lie about who she was or how she felt.

Being angry and frustrated hasn't worked well for them in the past. Lines get crossed and bad things happen but she was glad he was here. He was going to be her partner for at least one more time so she hoped they could get through this mission without any issues. This might be their last mission together and she didn't want it to end badly. Their partnership has been amazing from the start and that is something she'd hold onto forever.

* * *

After Callen had asked how he was doing, he entered their hotel room and shut the door behind him before turning towards her.

"Forensics! Kens, this is insane. We should be going home. It's too dangerous."

"I know it is Deeks!" She sighed. "But we can't…"

"Yes we can. We can walk away right now. We owe Mosley absolutely nothing. She has treated us with nothing but disrespect and this isn't an ncis related case, she can't make us do anything."

"If you came here to talk me out of it, you should've just stayed home Deeks. I already told you I'm going to bring this boy home to his mother."

"And what if you don't get an opportunity to do that because you die before then? It could all be for nothing. What did Hidoko accomplish?"

"It might not even be her."

"Then where is she?!"

"I don't know!" Her voice frustrated. The knock on the door interrupted their argument. When he looked through the peephole, Callen stood on the other side. He opened the door and waited for him to speak.

"Get changed, we're going down to that guy Turk's shop."

"Copy that." Deeks said and then closed the door again.

* * *

She sighed and threw the covers off of her, staring straight up at the ceiling.

"You okay?" His voice spoke in the silence of the night.

"I'm fine."

"Of course you are." He let out an annoyed huff.

"Sometimes fine just means fine, Deeks." Her voice harsch, leaving no room for argument.

He sighed. "We're not fine. You can't say you're fine when we can't agree on a future plan. Without a plan we're going to have no future. It's not healthy to keep avoiding or protecting…"

"You know what, just stop! I can't do this right now. I know you're angry but I can't go into a mission with a negative mindset. I don't want to argue with you!" She practically shouted with frustration and sadness.

There was a long silence as she waited for a reply, even thinking he'd finally fallen asleep when he spoke softly. "I'm not angry Kens."

"You seem angry."

"I'm just frustrated." She didn't know what to say to that. She knew she was disappointing him with not wanting what he wanted. "More just frustrated with myself, not you."

She turned onto her side so she could look at the silhouette of his form. "I'm sorry." He didn't say anything. "This is the biggest fight we've ever had."

"Well it's hard when you can't come to an agreement on life changing decisions."

"I don't know what I can say right now."

"I know, we can't get into this now. We need sleep." He turned to look at her as well. "We need to be sharp tomorrow so we can execute this mission in the best way possible."

"Okay."

"We rescue her son, go home and work this thing out."

* * *

The next day the horses were delivered and their op was a go. She had now changed into her jeans, button-up shirt and vest and was putting her hair up in a ponytail.

"Almost ready?" He asked.

She nodded. "Yeah."

"You can still back out."

"I'm good."

"Okay." He nodded, wrapping his head around the idea as she was putting her boots on. "I'm going to be ready with the truck. If something feels off, just leave…"

"Deeks…" She interrupted.

"Just leave, you have to think about yourself first. The boy's fine, we can get him another way later. You need to make sure you're safe." They stood across from each other. "You don't have to do this." He pleaded one last time.

Putting on her cowboy hat, ready for the op, she turned to him. "Yes I do." She looked him straight in the eye with determination. "Because this is what we do." It was true, their entire partnership and relationship were rooted in their job but maybe that wasn't the case anymore.

* * *

There it is! The ending isn't the most uplifting and a bit ambiguous but we'll have to hope for a happy return in season 10! Thank you to everyone who read, followed, favorited and reviewed my story! It has been so much fun writing these fanfic add-ons for each episode and getting such a positive response!

We'll have to survive this hiatus by rewatching old episodes and reading fanfictions all Summer. I promise I'll have more stories posted soon and maybe I'll be back with the season 10 add-on fan fics in the fall.


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